


Where the Devil Don't Go

by Gia279



Series: Strange Young World [3]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Laura, BAMF Stiles, Gore, Horror, M/M, Magical Apocalypse, Nuclear Apocalypse, POV Alternating, Plot Driven, Post-Apocalypse, Separation, Slow Build, Stiles Stilinski-centric, Survival, Witch!Stiles, creature horror, eventual reunions, minor self injury, mutations
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:01:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 31,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28417275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gia279/pseuds/Gia279
Summary: While Stiles and John fight their way through the mutated animals living in the jungle, Lydia and Boyd search for survivors with the rest of the crew. Laura just wants a safe place for her pack, and Lydia would give anything to find the people she and Boyd have been searching for since the beginning. Stiles wants to save them all from Della, no matter who he has to ask for help.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Series: Strange Young World [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1703503
Comments: 106
Kudos: 137





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This is _way_ later than I had planned, because some Life stuff happened but I'm nearly done now, and I'm so excited to share! Since I'm still writing the last few chapters, however, I'm going to only be posting **every other week** at least until I get too impatient for that. Hopefully by then I will be done, but we'll see. 
> 
> Also I actually tried with the summary this time and I'm _terrible_ at it lol, so if you still ventured in despite that, I thank you.

Stiles glanced up from the book in his lap, squinting over at John, but he was still fast asleep. They’d made camp for the night inside one of the enormous trees that made up the jungle they were traveling through. It had a deep hollow in the trunk about six feet up, big enough for both of them to stretch out comfortably. Stiles had covered it in camouflage and perimeter spells, but he was awake anyway, reading the Book of Shadows Asher had given him before he and John had left the ship. He hadn’t had the time or energy the past couple days to look through it, so now that his insomnia had returned, he’d finally cracked it open.

It had belonged to a witch called Elle Ritter. It was full of battle magic, spells that Stiles felt well equipped to duplicate, for once. Much better than garden magic, which he’d failed at miserably. 

He ran his fingers over the burned corner of the book absently, gaze on the opening of their little camp. The sky was hard to see during the day, given the thick canopy, and at night it was as if it’d never been there anyway. He looked back down at the page he’d been on, but just reading the spell wasn’t going to be enough. Just like any skill, only practice would truly hone it. He checked on his father again, unnecessarily—John was exhausted and slept deeply any chance he got. Like Stiles should’ve been doing. He marked his page with a piece of bark and tucked the book under his arm. 

Sharp pieces of wood dug into his palms and knees as he crawled to the opening of the hollow. He cast his senses, searching for danger, but if anything was hunting, it wasn’t coming their way. One last glance back at John, then he climbed awkwardly out of the tree, landing and tripping on the roots. He brushed dirt off his hands and grabbed the book from where it’d fallen, struggling in the absolute dark of the jungle. There was nothing he could use to contain the light he could create, and he was hesitant about creating a campfire, just in case it drew the attention of the countless predators prowling in the dark. 

He circled his index finger and thumb, creating a small light to read the page. 

Elle wrote that the spell he wanted to try was tied to the earth element, which wasn’t exactly Stiles’s best medium, but he could tap into it when he needed to. 

He nodded to himself and propped the book between some roots, rolling his shoulders to loosen up. He lifted his hands, fingers spread wide, and mimicked the magic Elle had described, the tug and pluck, yank and release. 

Thick roots shot out of the ground, hovering in front of him, looking like monstrous snakes in the dark. He pushed his left hand out and the roots followed, swaying and listless with no target. He swept his hand right, palm thrust out. 

The roots stabbed through a tree, blowing bark into the air. 

The spell clicked in his mind, settled, and he smiled. He moved the roots a few more times, jabbing and swatting at invisible enemies, feigning battle. He put his hand out, palm down, and the roots settled along the ground, docile. He grinned and grabbed the book, scanning the page. Apparently the spell could be used to shield, too. He looked back thoughtfully and mimed grabbing the roots, then turned his wrist and straightened his hand in one easy movement, toward the tree hollow where John was sleeping.

The roots rose and followed his hand, his unspoken commands, untangling and sealing over the opening, concealing John completely. 

Stiles grinned. “Cool.” He looked back at the book, holding up his light so he could read the next page.

The spell was also earth-based, and was meant to be used with caution. It would split the ground. Elle noted in the margins that it was good for _escaping._ What she was escaping in her pre-apocalypse life, Stiles did not know and could not guess. 

He set the book aside and rotated his wrists, wincing when the left one popped; he had a habit of keeping his left arm stiff and still whenever possible, hyperconscious of the metal cuff on his forearm. It was to keep the tracking curse on his arm from functioning properly, and so far it seemed to be working, but he couldn’t forget what was under it, no matter how hard he tried. 

Della Summers wanted to kill him and everyone around him with a single-minded bloodlust that had already killed hundreds, if not thousands. 

He shook himself. That was why he was learning new battle spells, wasn’t it? So he could protect John and whoever else he needed to, and so he could actually present a challenge when she inevitably found them. 

Della specialized in psychic magic and ice, but she’d killed countless witches in the ten years since the bombs, performing her own types of experimental spells to steal their magic to make herself strong. She’d even mastered garden magic, which was how she’d convinced nature spirits, mostly elves, to do her bidding. She wanted Stiles’s magic—the battle magic that he was skilled at was somewhat rare, given that most witches with battle magic had died trying to stop the nuclear bombs that’d destroyed everything and killed nearly everyone. She wanted to eliminate all possible threats to her grab for power, and after that…she wanted to take over and rule as a queen. 

Stiles shook off the fear and guilt, annoyed at himself for getting distracted. He had spells to try. “Okay,” he breathed. “Split the earth. Right.” He recalled Elle’s description of how she’d visualized where she wanted the split and _cut._ Spells came about differently for everyone, but he’d have to try it her way first if he wanted to learn it. So he inhaled and stared at the ground four feet away, picturing the silvery dirt, the leaf litter, and envisioned it splitting apart, a gaping shadow where the solid ground once was. He sliced his hand through the air. 

Leaves blew across the ground, but the dirt remained unmoved. 

He flexed his fingers and tried again, more forcefully. Spidery cracks spread from where he was aiming. He pushed harder with a grunt. 

The leaves scattered around caught fire. 

He squeezed his fist, extinguishing the flames, and glowered at the smoking remains. It was a hard spell for a reason, he knew. The earth might offer up its plants for use, might kill and protect on command, but it didn’t split open for just anyone. He eyed the cracks. He _could_ try again, but it seemed like a waste of energy. He knew the mechanics of the spell now and could practice it later. 

Shoulders slumped, he trudged back to the tree for the book. He needed a break anyway. If he wasn’t going to sleep, he should at least rest so he wouldn’t be completely useless on the walk the next day. He collapsed among the roots and rested the book against his knees, lifting his little light so he could read on. He wanted to see what else Elle had to offer. 

She had battle spells of _all_ types, some to put people to sleep, to torture before she killed, using several elements, some even she didn’t understand. 

Stiles ran his fingers over the page, felt the protective, preservative magic in the ink, and swore to keep practicing until he knew all of them. He tilted his head back and waved a hand at the roots sealing John into the tree. 

He pulled the book closer and held up one finger, crooking it like he was beckoning someone, just like Elle’s instructions told him to. The air around him shifted restlessly, a self-contained breeze that barely stirred his hair. It seemed to press close, almost solid against his cheeks and chin, his arms, before the spell crumbled, failing. 

It was meant to hide him in plain sight, like the air itself could become a wall to hide behind. Elle had a couple spells like this, meant to hide her presence using whatever was available without her moving. 

He couldn’t quite manage it, but it must’ve been a favorite of Elle’s, as the page was marked with stars across the top. He wondered what line of work she was in. Certainly nothing pleasant. He tried the spell again, halfheartedly. It seemed like a lot to ask of _air_ , so he wasn’t expecting much. The spell fizzled out quicker the second time, and the third try barely stirred a breeze. 

Disappointed but unsurprised, he turned the page. Another spell, only this one supposedly turned the air sharp “like blades”. He read the instructions a couple times before getting up. He was pretty sure he needed to be on his feet for it. He held both hands in front of him, palms up, flat, and imagined the air sharpening like knives on the tips of his fingers, dancing, spinning, sharp and dangerous. 

The air swirled around his wrists, caressing his palms and fingers. He ramped up the power, brows furrowing, jaw clenching. He stretched his fingers out and grasped at the breeze with his magic; the spell felt delicate in a way he wasn’t used to with attack spells and it was strange, uncomfortable. 

The sun began to rise, noticeable only in the faintest streaks of light through the trees, the heightening humidity that had sweat gathering at his temples and upper lip.

The air above his hands flashed. It was hardly visible, just a distortion of the air, but it felt amazing. Stiles flexed his hand and twisted his wrist, hurling them at the nearest tree—the one he’d already attacked with the roots. 

The air cut through bark like a knife through butter, shaving it down the side. 

“Whoa.”

“Stiles?” John nearly tumbled head-first out of the tree. 

“Down here, you okay?”

He glared blearily at him. “Don’t _do_ that.”

Stiles grabbed the book. “Do what? The sun is coming up,” he said without waiting for an answer. “We should probably pack up.” He climbed the tree. 

John kept glowering when Stiles was back in the hollow. “You know what,” he muttered at last, turning stiffly to gather his things—his ragged blanket and his backpack, the water jug he’d sipped at in the night. 

“Sorry.” Stiles rolled his own blanket up and packed it away, then set the Book of Shadows on top. He’d probably try using it while they walked. “Do you need help getting down?”

“No.” He wasn’t much of a morning person.

Stiles rubbed his eyes and waved at John to go down first. He suspected he had four hours before his eyes started burning, six before a headache started. He definitely needed to get sleep that night. He clambered down after John and cast his senses as soon as his feet were on the ground to figure out which way they needed to go. Past John, there was the ever-present glow of his connections to Laura, Derek, and Peter Hale, improbable but undeniably powerful, unwavering. Then there were the quiet, steady threads to Lydia and Boyd, familiar even though they’d been missing when he’d first woken up, stretched to oblivion after ten years. 

The crew—Ari and her ship full of loyal friends that were more like family—were faint to Stiles now, but that was normal, considering he barely knew them. Time and distance faded new bonds. 

There was also a faint, silvery connection fluttering at the back of his mind, flickering in and out of existence, that he _still_ didn’t understand. It didn’t feel like anyone he knew, which was—should have been—impossible. He needed to _know_ someone to have a connection to them. 

He made himself let it go; he had other things to focus on. He’d figure this out later. He stretched away from himself and his connections, through the seemingly endless sprawl of trees, teeming with life, the rivers and streams and found…power. 

There was a pulse of magic and _life_ emanating from deep in the jungle. They were still far away, so far away it felt impossible, but they were heading in the right direction. They needed to keep going straight south. 

He opened his eyes. He could only hope that what he was feeling was the settlement and not another trap.

John gestured at the disturbed dirt and ravaged tree. “Practicing?”

“Yep. The witch who wrote the book made good use of the elements, much better than I managed before.”

“Well, you didn’t have much of a reason to create battle spells before.”

Stiles shrugged; he knew John was right, but he also knew that he could’ve nurtured his own type of magic a little better, too. He didn’t have to be fighting to survive to practice in the backyard.

John shook his head with a small, frustrated smile. 

Stiles dropped his gaze to a space near the tree they’d camped in and held his hand out.

A magical marker roared out of the ground, spiraling orange and white flames dancing over seven feet tall. Asher, Lydia, and Boyd would be able to see it when they eventually followed Stiles and John to the settlement, hopefully leading the rest of the crew and some fighters so they could face Della on equal footing. 

Stiles turned away from the marker, wishing, not for the first time, that he’d stayed with them, or that he’d brought them with. They’d only just found each other. But he’d had his reasons, and they were good reasons, even if he regretted it. 

John waited until Stiles started walking to hitch his bag up and keep pace. “You’re gonna need to sleep eventually,” he commented, climbing over raised roots. 

Stiles nodded. “I know. Tonight.” He rubbed his eyes. Definitely. 

The jungle, which Stiles was calling it despite not being entirely sure where they were, was interesting and terrifying at once. The trees soared overhead and blocked out most light with shivering, thick brown leaves or thin, sparkling black leaves, topping trunks made of twisting, deep green or smooth, tangerine-colored bark. The ground was soft, mostly silvery clay hidden by leaf litter and the raised roots of trees. The air was thick and humid, no breeze daring breach the tightly packed trees. 

It made the noises—insect chitters, John’s foot falls and Stiles’s breathing, distant, animal roars—so much louder. 

Stiles watched his feet as he walked, senses prickling as he made himself stay alert to potential attacks. 

John inhaled sharply. 

He looked up, hands lifting, but John caught his wrist. 

Twenty feet away, an antelope picked its way through tall roots. Its coat was glistening like it’d just emerged from the ocean. It had antlers like living coral, brilliant green and blue rising above liquid black eyes. It moved quietly and delicately, barely paying them any mind. Where it walked, water flowed, a thin, gurgling stream unfurling along its path. 

Stiles caught his breath, watching its progress. It looked regal, like some kind of sea god come to bring streams to the land. He glanced at John, who looked at him, both of them wearing expressions of relief. At least it hadn’t tried to kill them, like so many other animals they’d come across since waking. He looked back at the antelope, guessing how much space they should give it before continuing their own journey. 

A red-brown blur dropped from above, hitting the antelope square in the back. Long, hairy arms and legs wrapped around it and tightened before both the creature and the antelope sling shot back up into a tree. 

Stiles grabbed John’s sleeve and ran, head ducked, free hand lifted to ward off attacks. “ _Holy hell!_ ”

“What was that?” John demanded as he splashed through the stream. 

“I don’t know.” He stumbled over his own feet and twisted to stay upright. 

John smacked his shoulder. 

“What?” He followed John’s pointing hand and recoiled. 

In some of the fluffy brown leaves, a sloth the size of an orangutan was rolling the struggling antelope in shiny, thick webbing like a giant spider. Its fur was shaggy red-brown and green, its claws bright blue and gleaming like metal. 

“We should go,” John muttered. “Before it decides to pick up dinner, too.”

“Uh-huh.” Stiles’s mouth felt dry and weird. 

They left the area at a jog, with John leading and Stiles keeping half of his attention on the canopy, prepared for attacks from above. 

The sky seemed to darken, the air growing thicker, making their clothes feel clingy and damp.

“At least it wasn’t a tiger,” John panted. 

“Don’t say that, you’ll jinx us.” Stiles glanced over his shoulder, paranoid. 

The shadows were shifting and murky, grayish in the weak light. The back of his neck prickled. 

“As long as we pay attention, we’ll be okay.” He sounded surer than Stiles felt. 

The air felt smothering and damp, thickening like soup as they walked. Stiles couldn’t shake off the prickling at the back of his neck, even when the sun briefly broke through the gloom. He swallowed dryly and cast his senses, a close-by inspection, and felt danger. He put a hand on John’s arm. “Wait.” 

John looked at him, impatience playing over his flushed face. “Stiles, wh-”

He waved a hand, shushing him, senses pinging. He spun around, seeking. 

Four elves stepped out of a tree behind them, moving through the trunk like a doorway. They were armed with knives and sticky white vines that Stiles knew would dampen his magic if wrapped around his hands. 

The elf leading the group grinned, sharp teeth flashing, and shook his deep emerald hair back. “We thought that was you. Queen Della wants you.”

“For gods’ sake,” John muttered, taking his gun out of the holster he kept on his belt. 

The elves glanced at him warily. 

Stiles shifted in front of him, trying to block him from view. “Why doesn’t Della come get me herself?”

“ _Her Majesty_ has better things to do.”

Stiles laughed mockingly. “You mean she’s got you out here looking for the Queen of the South because she’s too afraid to do it herself.” 

“Watch your mouth,” an elf with short black hair snarled. 

“No.” He flexed his fingers at his sides. “I suggest you go on your way.”

“We’re taking you to the queen.” They spread out, trying to get behind them, moving in tandem. 

Stiles lifted his left hand, palm up, and twisted his wrist. 

Roots shot out of the ground; the sharp end of one impaled the green-haired elf through the chest before he could step closer. Stiles turned his hand. Roots caught an elf wearing vines in her hair by the arms, wrapping up to her shoulders and then her neck. 

A gunshot fired and an elf yelped in pain.

Stiles clenched his fists; the roots compressed, snapping the elf’s neck. His magic surged inside with their deaths, twisting and pulsing, creeping out of his palms as flames, skating over his fingers. 

He turned, ready to strike, and saw that John had already shot the other two elves, their corpses crumpled at his feet. Stiles snaked the roots over them, dragging them to the other two. He stared, clamping one hand around the wrist cuff. Had they been found or had he guessed right? He hissed and dropped his hand; the fire on his hands had heated up the metal. He felt at it with his magic, but it was still scattering the tracking curse on his arm like it was supposed to. He had so many mental walls and shields up to keep Della out of his mind that he couldn’t sense what she was doing or planning or feeling anymore. It seemed like a small price to pay to keep from sharing her dreams and keeping her out of his head, but now he couldn’t know for sure if they’d been discovered or not. 

“Stiles,” John said. “She’d be stupid _not_ to have scouts on the way to the settlement to intercept people on their way there.” 

Stiles nodded, kicking at a broken root. As if it wasn’t bad enough that they were alone, surrounded by dangerous, mutated animals. 

“We just have to be prepared,” John continued. “On our guard. We did well,” he reminded Stiles. “Not even a scratch on either of us.”

“Yeah,” he muttered. “But that was only four.” How many more might there be, the closer they got to the settlement, the deeper they went into the jungle? He shook the flames off his hands, for once not completely distracted by the giddy power rush he got from fighting magically, from _winning._

Above, the sky darkened and thunder rumbled. As they walked, rain pattered down through the canopy, a slow drizzle that built to a roaring downpour in minutes. Stiles was taking it as an omen.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm nearly finished, and then I'll start posting once a week instead of every other week! <3

He was supposed to be sleeping. Again. He was certainly tired enough, had felt himself drifting off while they set up camp, but as he lay curled under his ragged blanket, head resting on his backpack, he couldn’t force his eyes to close or his thoughts to quiet. He reached out to check on everyone, hoping peace of mind would ease him to sleep. Instead, he felt that feeble, unidentifiable connection bloom in his mind again, flooding his system with unease. Troubled, he felt at Laura’s tether, Derek’s, Peter’s, but they all felt fine—content, peaceful, so he didn’t _understand_ who it was or why he could sense them. And he certainly couldn’t sleep like this. He rubbed his eyes and propped himself up on his elbows. 

John was sitting cross-legged by Stiles’s feet, picking at a jar of parsnips Asher had grown for their journey. Rain beat down on their makeshift shelter, roots Stiles had closed over them like a tent, creating a pleasant white noise that _should’ve_ lulled him to sleep. John lifted a brow at Stiles. 

He huffed and rolled onto his side. It wasn’t like he was _trying_ to stay awake. His body was exhausted, his muscles sore, and he had a myriad of new cuts from walking through sharp bramble. And he was wide awake, staring at the deep brown and blue roots covering them. He stretched his legs out, flexing his toes in his boots, and pulled his blanket up to his chin, but there was just no making dirt comfortable. His mouth curled in a self-mocking smirk. He’d gotten spoiled on the ship, having a bed to sleep in every night, a shower to use. It’d been cold and weak, the mattress lumpy and a little charred, but way better than this. He ran his fingertips over the dirt under his back, dug them beneath the damp surface. 

His perimeter spells were intact, camouflaging in place, all sorts of repellents buzzing on the root tent they were in. They were as protected as he could possibly make them. He should’ve been able to sleep. 

He listened to John for a while: listened to him reorganize his bag, check over the various firearms he’d acquired, and hum to himself. 

With his eyes shut, Stiles could pretend he’d fallen asleep on the couch waiting for John to get home from a late shift at the station, waking only enough to hear John moving around in the kitchen in what he thought was a quiet way. 

It still didn’t help him sleep. He squeezed his eyes shut and turned his attention inward. It hurt too much to peek at his friend’s connections, like prodding a bruise, so he focused on the weak, flickering silver one. Like a newly formed connection that would solidify over time, except he hadn’t met anyone and he couldn’t sense who was on the other side. He imagined grasping the connection like a rope, but it slipped away like smoke. He rubbed his fingers against the dirt mindlessly and dove into the bond mentally, letting his exhaustion and barely-suppressed fear flood down it; it just bounced back at him, reflecting that silvery light. He made himself breathe deeply, relaxing his body one muscle at a time, magic focused on that strange bond. Slowly, slowly, feelings came to him, jagged and un-whole. 

Fear but abstract, distant. A strange, giddy joy. Confusion, spiking through the joy. Physical sensations followed: weakness, exhaustion, queasiness. Whoever was on the other end was sick and shaky, fading. 

Stiles fell into a fitful doze while he was trying to puzzle out who it was. 

He woke after dawn, watery gray light poking through their shelter. 

John was already packed, ankles crossed in a catnap, probably for the best. 

Stiles let him sleep while he shook off his blanket and folded it, packed it away, and ate some breakfast—magically preserved fish and carrots. They’d set their jugs out to collect rain, but Stiles was hoping they’d find a body of water soon, so he could scrape some of the grime off. Pretty soon he’d start smelling like a carcass. He zipped his bag up and glanced at John; he didn’t want to wake him, so instead he lowered part of the roots and took down the spells to check the water jugs. They were full and would add an unpleasant but necessary weight to their bagsF. 

Stiles grabbed all four and sealed them, lined them up, and held his hands over them. A witch named Bizzy had taught him a water purification spell that’d probably been the only reason Stiles and John had survived as long as they had. Who knew how sick they might’ve gotten from creek or river water. 

A worried frown crossed his face, but the mystery connection was gone, faded like it’d never been there, and he couldn’t make it come back no matter how far he reached. He’d just have to wait until it returned on its own. He watched the purification spell glow in the water for a moment before it dissipated, leaving the water clear and drinkable.

He hoped whoever was on the unreachable end of that bond didn’t die. They needed help, he could feel it, but there wasn’t anything he could do when he couldn’t find them, could barely feel them except in moments of extreme distress. 

“Oh, good. We’ve got plenty of water.” John’s voice made him jump as he emerged from the shelter. “You slept a bit.”

“So did you. During your watch.” Stiles poked his side. “You’re going to get us eaten, old man.”

“Nothing would dare eat you, son, you smell like week old gym socks.” He smiled sharply. 

“Yeah, you’re not exactly smelling like Irish Springs yourself.” Stiles picked up two of the water jugs. “We should get moving.”

“Yeah, yeah, let me get my bag.”

Stiles waved away the roots and created a marker for the others while he waited. “I hope we’re going in the right direction,” he mused. When John shot him an alarmed look, he said, “Well, it _feels_ like the right direction, but I can’t possibly know for sure until we get there.”

“I’m aware. That’s as good as it gets, I guess.”

Stiles tried not to take it personally. It _was_ a gamble, and he was concerned, too. “Well, let’s find a body of water, okay? That way we can rinse off and I can try to get a better sense of where we’re going.” He didn’t tell John that he was worried about whether the settlement had protections against finding it—it most certainly would have protections, but to guard against sensing? How would other witches find it?

John found the pond first, a wide, clear-ish body of water with mud on the banks, rippling in a slight breeze. It was being fed by a fast moving river, widening and then tapering on the other end. 

Stiles could sense life in the water, but he couldn’t tell what kind. He eyed the water and tried to guess what might be in it, waiting under the surface for easy prey. Crocodiles? Leeches? Piranhas? “Be careful,” he said at last. “There’s…things in there.”

John eyed the calm surface. “Should we keep moving?”

He shook his head. “I think we’re okay, just keep your eyes peeled.” He grabbed a branch and tossed it in the center; the splash disturbed the entire surface. He held his breath. 

Nothing happened. 

Stiles sighed. “Alright. I’m just gonna keep watch.”

John made a face at him and set his bag down, pulling out one of the rags and a bar of soap the crew had given them. 

Stiles kept his gaze trained on the water, throat tightening at the reminder of Mad Hollow, a small outdoor mall set up that Della had destroyed in order to weaken Ari by taking away her access to supplies. Just like she’d destroyed every other attempt at making a settlement in the past ten years. 

Except the Queen of the South. Della was inexplicably afraid of her and hadn’t yet dared to attack. 

That gave Stiles a flicker of hope.

John threw a dry rag at Stiles. “ _Please._ ” His hair was damp and his face was cleaner than it’d been in days, though there was nothing he could do about the patchy beard he had growing in. That and the bags under his eyes made him look haggard, face creased by days in the sun, hair wild on his head. 

Stiles’s gut lurched with worry just looking at him, though he suspected he wasn’t much better; Stilinski men weren’t exactly known for their rugged outdoor-man beards or survivalist lifestyles. “Just watch the water,” he grumbled, grabbing the rag and soap. He stopped short of getting in the water, just close enough that he could lather up the rag and scrub as much of himself as he could with his clothes on. The water was tepid and smelled strongly like fish, and it felt a bit gritty against his skin, but the effect was still cathartic. Something about getting a little clean made him feel like a person again, even if it was questionable pond water. It was like giving his spirits a good scrub at the same time. He turned his head to rub the towel over the back of his neck.

A nose, like a tiny elephant’s trunk, poked out of the water just six feet away. 

He froze, gaze darting. He slid one foot back. 

A tapir surfaced, observing him with pale, bored eyes as it munched on some wet foliage. Along its sides were what looked like gills, and its tail was long and webbed, resting on the surface of the water. 

Stiles backed up another step, then another. “Be careful,” he mumbled, noticing John’s gun trained on it. “Some of these things are armored.”

“It doesn’t look very interested in us,” he pointed out, relaxing his stance. 

“Yeah, but just in case…” He swung his backpack on.

A black cat lunged out of the water, limbs spread so it looked like a rug, and landed on the tapir’s back. The tapir screamed as the cat—the jaguar?—latched its teeth around its neck and dragged it, thrashing, under the surface. 

Stiles flipped a hand at John to shoo him toward his bag. They backed away from the pond together, gazes locked on the churning water. Stiles really hoped the jaguar or whatever it was kept busy with the tapir, enough to leave them alone. 

They went around the pond by cutting through the river to the east, using rocks so they didn’t have to step in the water. Stiles tilted his head back as they left the river; the leaves above them were deep blue and wide, blocking out the sky as usual. The air was heavy and humid again, making the walk even more miserable. Stiles felt like he was walking through soup. It didn’t help that the ground was damp and marshy from the rain, sucking at their boots with every step. 

Something cold and soft brushed down Stiles’s cheek, another down his chin. He looked up and groaned; despite the heat and sunshine, fluffy white snow was falling like powdered sugar, melting long before it hit the ground. 

John just sighed. 

Stiles got the Book of Shadows out of his bag. Since they’d be walking all day, he might as well practice some new spells. The earth-based spells seemed to have been Elle’s specialty, since there were more of those than any others. 

John held the book while Stiles practiced, so his hands were free. 

It took seven tries, but Stiles threw his right arm forward like he was bowling and, at last, the ground opened up, a fissure so violent it split a green and silver tree right up the middle. He bit down on his lip to keep from cheering and turned in place, lifting his hands like a conductor. 

The ground rose up behind them in a wide hill, spreading between two trees. The spell clicked. 

Stiles laughed breathlessly. “Gimme.” He wiggled his fingers at the book. 

John snickered and passed it back.

Stiles felt like a kid learning magic all over again, following his mother’s potion recipes, practicing magic in the backyard while they figured out what he was good at. A memory flashed in his mind, a split second image of Claudia frowning worriedly at him when they’d figured out how easily he created fire. He made himself shake it off; after all, what parent _wouldn’t_ be worried about a six-year-old who could create fire at will? Besides, Claudia helped him learn to protect as well as he could destroy, and that was just as important to remember. 

He dropped his gaze to the page, forcing himself to focus. He had a whole book of new spells to try out. If anything could keep him busy, it was that. 

He studied the spell for a while, with half of his attention on the life around him. He didn’t want to get jumped by a sloth with webbing or an aquatic jaguar. 

“Ready to try it?”

Stiles rolled his eyes. “Are you getting bored?”

“Yes.”

The walk was pretty boring aside from, obviously, being braced for possible attacks. He passed the book over and centered himself, casting his senses down instead of out, into the ground like burrowing worms. He inhaled—and tripped over a root. His concentration snapped and he flushed as he righted himself. 

John didn’t laugh or look over; he was studying the book.

Stiles looked away, calming himself again. When he dug into the dirt, he didn’t wait; he reached out and grabbed as many as he could. He turned his wrists and lifted his hands. 

Stones rose out of the ground, ranging from pebbles to at least ten pounds, shooting above their heads and hovering. 

Stiles grinned and rotated his wrists. 

The stones circled above like a halo, wide enough that if he lost his grip, they wouldn’t hit him or John. They bumped off trees and branches, each other, and bounced on the ground in his direction. When he flicked his fingers, they shot off like bullets, cracking against trees. The spell settled inside, clicked, became a part of him. Elle _had_ marked it as easy. He dropped his hands; the ground underfoot shook as the stones fell.

“Impressive. You’re getting good at that,” John said. 

Stiles grinned. “Thanks.” It was a good feeling, both John’s praise and his own success. Trying and failing to do garden magic had made him feel like a failure, had shamed him, made him feel unworthy as a witch. These spells, however, were things he could do, and do well. He continued to study the book as they walked, entertaining John with both his successes and failures, which made it easier to laugh at them. He used a withering spell on a clump of red, poisonous bramble, humming with danger, and a crushing spell on a group of rat-sized purple ants that surrounded them as they were walking. The crushing spell was…messier than he’d been expecting. 

John shook his boot off. “Gross.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” Stiles pressed his hands to his stomach. “Lunch?”

John looked at the ant remains.

“ _Away_ from here, obviously.”

“Sure.”

They got just far enough away that they couldn’t see the mess and sat on the roots of a black tree. It gave off cold air, like an air conditioner, and the roots felt cool under their legs. It was nice, a reprieve from the humid heat of the rest of the jungle. 

They were running out of food; they’d left Ari’s ship with supplies, of course, but only what they could carry, which amounted to just a few days’ worth of food for both of them. They picked at their fish carefully, both of them acutely aware that in a day (or two if they skipped some) they’d run out of protein. Protein meant energy; no protein, low energy, slow travel. They’d have to hunt for something, cook it. They’d done it before, between separating from the Hales and meeting Ari’s crew, but Stiles still didn’t like it. 

John paged through the Book of Shadows idly while they ate, enjoying the cool aura of the tree.

Stiles studied him; he’d never seen John read spells or potion recipes before. He felt out at him tentatively, but John was content, a little stressed and determined, nothing out of the ordinary. 

“Done snooping?” he asked mildly without lifting his head. 

Stiles flushed. “How’d you know?”

He shrugged. “I’ve known you your whole life. I’d like to think I know all of your tells.”

“And you don’t plan on telling me what they are?”

He looked up and smiled. “Why would I do that?”

Stiles rolled his eyes and finished his last celery stick before closing the jar and tucking it away. He was wiping his fingers on his pants when the hair on his arms rose. He swallowed and cast his senses. 

That faint connection was back, flickering and weak, a spike of dread and heavy illness coming through the malformed bond. 

He also felt a threat coming toward them. He moved next to John, putting a finger up to shush him. He swept his right hand out and up, gathering shadows around them, and held himself rigid, balanced on the balls of his feet. 

About nine elves paraded by a moment later. 

John twitched. 

Stiles set his left hand on his arm, fingers tense. 

The elves were eerily quiet and emotionless, like toy soldiers, as they moved by, walking in tandem. Their clothes were white, or once white, made of bleached leather. 

He frowned and prodded at their minds and auras impulsively. He flinched when he sensed poison—wolfsbane, actually. Why? What did they need that for in a witch settlement? It was a lot, too, a cloud-like aura of poison spiking from them. He inhaled quietly and let it out, pinpointing which elf had the wolfsbane.

The third to last, carrying a rough leather satchel made of the same bleached material they were wearing, looped over his shoulders. His hand rested on the strap protectively. 

Stiles bit his lip and lifted his left hand. 

John shut his eyes, which was fair; Stiles had never been great at control. Power, he had. Precision, not so much. He poured magic into the shadows hiding them and hoped he could do what he had in mind. The elves were no more than ten feet away from them, easily in sight if he lost his grip on the shadows. He spread his fingers wide and fired electricity at the elf, the same spell he’d once shot at bloodsucking butterflies. It worked like it was supposed to this time, a blast of blue-white lightning striking the elf from the side. Stiles clenched his other hand, wrapping a shield around the satchel while the lightning fried the elf, lifting him off his feet. 

The others scattered, shouting, but Stiles barely heard them, his concentration stretched to its limits keeping three spells active. The elf collapsed, both of his hearts stopped, his body blackened and smoking. The stench was overwhelming. 

Stiles dropped his hands, breathing hard. 

The other elves were looking up at the sky, searching for storm clouds. They were talking to each other in what sounded like Arabic, spoken with ease, rolling from their mouths like honey, and shaking their heads. They prodded their fallen comrade, but he was obviously past saving. They switched to French, muttering something almost gentle, and moved on. 

Stiles clenched his fists on top of his knees to smother the flames dancing on his palms. He had to get control of these power surges. They were getting stronger. 

John opened his eyes and stared at the smoking corpse. 

Stiles swallowed, trying not to breathe through his nose. It didn’t matter. The stench was almost strong enough to _taste_ and it was awful.

He monitored the other eight elves as they walked away, waiting until they were long gone to drop their camouflage. His legs were tingling by the time he climbed off the root, wincing as blood rushed back to them. He crept over to the body and used the tip of his boot to roll it over, grimacing at the crackling noise it made. 

The bag was intact. 

He breathed a sigh of relief and picked it up, flipped it open. 

Purple and deep blue flowers glittered on silvery stems like they were wet. They gave off powerful poisonous hums, making the bag tremble in his hands. A knife crusted with blood was tangled in them, the tip gleaming at an angle. 

“What’s wrong?”

Stiles looked up slowly and tilted the bag to show him. “I think someone’s hurt.” He closed his eyes and searched for that connection he kept feeling, but it was faint, ghostly. He frowned, reaching further. 

The ground rumbled under foot. A new, deep hum filled the air. 

Stiles opened his eyes, frowning at the bag of wolfsbane. Was it magic rumbling the ground, humming in his ears? It didn’t feel like it.

“It’s coming from under us.” John took a step back toward the black tree, gaze on the ground. 

The dirt split open, knocking Stiles off his feet. 

He landed on his hip hard and sat, stunned, as huge, red jaws snapped around the blackened corpse and dragged it underground. 

Across from the first, another crocodile burst out, bellowing at the one retreating.

“Dad! _Climb._ ” Stiles scrambled to his feet, wild eyed. 

The crocodile was the color of blood, deep blue-red, its eyes full white, teeth sticking out around its long, narrow snout. 

Stiles threw his hands out, blasting fire at it instinctively. 

The flames rolled off its scales like water. It twisted sinuously and bellowed, charging at him.

He backpedaled and hurled a shield around himself, breathing hard. He flinched as it attacked the shield, barely affected by the repellent magic. He had to find some stronger shields for the predators in this world. He looked up and found John in the lowest branches of the black tree, close enough that Stiles’s heart lurched. He looked back at the crocodile snapping at his shield. How hard would it be for it to climb or even jump to get John once it got bored trying to get at him? He flinched again at the sound of its jaws snapping. He looked at the hole it had burst from, mind turning.

The alligator he faced had had armored scales that had resisted most of his spells, all but the strongest. His instinct was blast, explode, fire, heat; it was his go-to element, but it may not work, and then John might get hurt. 

He took a deep breath and put his hands up, palms facing each other, fingers straight like he was about to clap. He began to curl his fingers in like claws. 

The hole the crocodile had emerged from split open, yawning wide, dirt bunching up into piles on either side. The dirt rose like waves and converged on the crocodile, swallowing it back into the depths it had emerged from. 

Stiles kept pulling, piling dirt on the crocodile, driving it further and further beneath the surface, crumbling dirt piling on like an ant hill. 

“Stiles,” John called.

He jumped. He blinked at the mound that looked like a fresh grave and dropped his hands. He swept the shield away and rushed over to where he’d dropped the bag. A couple flowers had spilled out, but he left them. The poison was so powerful that they made his eyes sting. He closed the bag. 

_Help._

Distress and pain and fear rushed through the connection, which was still weak and flickering. 

He looked at John. “We have to find them.”

John climbed out of the tree carefully. “The injured person?” he asked warily. 

Stiles nodded. 

“I agree.” 

He nearly slumped with relief. “We won’t get off track,” he promised. They only had two weeks, after all, before Lydia, Boyd, and Ari’s crew followed them into the jungle, hopefully with an army to fight against Della. He created a marker on top of the dirt mound and they set off, following the distress call.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D I finished writing this! I have not finished typing or editing, but I think once a week is good enough now x)

Stiles ducked under prickly, low hanging branches, pushed them out of the way for John, and stared blankly over his shoulder. They were following his invisible trail, the sense in his head, hopefully to the person who needed their help. Who he _knew_ needed their help, even if he shouldn’t have known. He shifted his boot out of the mud it was sinking into and cast his senses, but they didn’t tell him much, just what he already knew. Whoever was reaching out was in pain and needed help.

The wind whipped through, smacking the prickly branches against Stiles’s face. 

He yelped and reared back. “Ow, damn it!” He clapped his hand over the cuts on his cheek.

The leaves above them rustled noisily. 

“Come on,” John said slowly. “We better keep moving.”

They moved on, heads ducked against the furious wind. Dirt and bark swirled in the air, battering at their shoulders and faces while the wind snapped their clothes, tugging back and forth like kids fighting over a toy. 

A branch creaked ominously overhead, bouncing up and down with the wind. 

Stiles kept his eye on it as they hurried out from under it. 

_Crack!_

The branch broke like a bone snapping and crashed to the ground, leaving a sizable gap in the canopy.

The sky was slate gray with churning, ferocious clouds gathering overhead. 

John yanked on Stiles’s arm. He had one hand up to shield his eyes from the dirt flying. A piece of bark flew by and gouged open his cheek.

Stiles lurched for him, but it was too late. He winced when the wind shoved him like hands on his back, his shoulders. 

“This is dangerous.” John tilted his head back to watch the sky, blood trickling back toward his ear. He lunged, shoving Stiles with two hands on his chest. 

Stiles flew off his feet, splashing down in mud. He looked up, mouth opening to snap, just as a sloth slammed into the dirt where he’d been standing. 

It launched back into the tree without dinner, curling its long limbs up like it was bracing for another drop.

Stiles scrambled to his feet. “Thanks.” Above, the clouds were turning yellowish. 

A strange, melancholy scream pierced the air as the wind picked up, sending them stumbling as they were fleeing the sloth’s range. 

Stiles rubbed his eyes impatiently, his vision blurred by dirt. It felt like his ears needed to pop, but he couldn’t make them, even working his jaw. 

Fat raindrops spattered his cheeks like tears, chilly and heavy. More followed, slowly picking up speed, turning the already muddy ground slicker. Stiles’s boots resisted with every step, sinking further and further into the mud.

That scream came again, carrying over the howling wind and crackle of breaking branches. Leaves fell with the rain like their own storm, sticking to them and then getting swept away by the raging wind. Sticks, dirt, and leaves blew in swirling clumps, obscuring the ground and path ahead. 

Stiles swore under his breath, sweeping a hand in front of them to clear the way, but it only lasted a second before the wind blew more in their path. 

John caught Stiles’s wrist. “Look.” The clouds where he was pointing were twisting in on themselves, like funnels. 

Stiles felt a burst of desperation, misery, and turned. 

There was some kind of rock and dirt formation rising out of the ground in the distance, and a cave, dug out by time or creatures, small and lonely. 

“We need to go there.” The wind whipped through, nearly ripping the satchel off Stiles’s shoulders. It knocked him forward. He turned his head, blinking rain out of his eyes. 

Two other funnel clouds were forming.

“Jeeze.”

John grabbed his hand. “Move!” They held onto each other to stay together, hands clasped tightly enough to grind bone. 

The ground moved. 

Stiles tightened his grip on John and sprang left, tangling in tree branches and toppling them both to the ground between its roots. 

Instead of a crocodile, though, a herd of antelope thundered by, spattering them with mud and wet leaves as they fled. 

John yelped, jerking his hand out of Stiles’s.

Stiles twisted, panicked, but he just waved him away. 

His shirt was bloody. “Just a rock,” he said, and jumped when another struck him.

Stiles lifted a hand to shield them. “ _Ow._ ” A rock struck the back of his hand, cracking across his knuckles and knocking it down. He shook it. “We need to find cover, come on.” He grabbed John’s hand again and ran. He could sense the cave, and the desperation, just ahead of them. They only had to make it to the rock formation before the storm swept them off their feet. 

Rain fell in sheets, sinking them in mud past their ankles. Debris whipped past, smacking into them and knocking them around. If Stiles couldn’t sense the _life_ in that cave, following it like a beacon, they would’ve already lost their way. 

A sharp sting had Stiles clapping a hand to his cheek, cursing breathlessly as his eyes watered. He clenched his hand tighter around John’s while the wind tugged at them. His feet tangled, nearly sending them both down. 

It felt like the wind could knock them off their feet at any moment, pushing and pulling in every direction. 

They skidded into the cave, soaked to the bone and bruised, bleeding from superficial cuts. Stiles shook his hands and swept one up, fingers clenching, to block the opening with roots. The howl of the wind cut down by half, leaving his ears ringing. Inside, Stiles felt a _click_ , a jolt of rightness, a connection snapping into place, finally whole and clear. And painful. He spun around, wet boots flying out from under him; he caught himself on the stone wall. 

The woman was filthy with mud and blood, sweating, her gold eyes glowing with animal fear and fever. She snarled, baring her teeth, and held up a shaking hand, trying to ward them off. 

Who was she? Stiles had never met her before, he could tell despite the mud smearing her features to blurs. Even so, he had some kind of connection to her, and she was in pain. He crawled forward, reaching out.

She flinched and let out a weak cry, claws flashing briefly. 

Stiles inhaled sharply. She could smell the poison in the satchel on his hip, and she recognized it, knew the blistering burn of it. She’d been poisoned, like he’d guessed. “I know how to-”

Her eyes rolled up. She slipped back to the ground, mouth lolling open. 

“-help.” He rubbed his eyes. “Dad, does your Maglite still work? I can’t start a fire in here and I need both of my hands.”

“Yeah.” John flicked his flashlight on and set it on the ground, pointed at the ceiling of the cave. 

“Okay. I need you to find all of the wounds on her. They’ll have black and gray lines around them and be hot to the touch.”

John nodded and approached the prone woman.

“And be careful. She’s a werewolf.” He flipped the satchel open. The flowers were soggy and wilted, but they would still work. He held his hand over the bag and incinerated all of them. 

The leather bubbled and smoked, the heat filling and humidifying the little cave as the flowers burned to ash. 

It made Stiles’s eyes water, nose burning from the fumes. 

“Got a few stab wounds and gashes. Ready?”

“Uh-huh.” He scooped the ash into his hands, wincing as it burned and stung, and applied it to every wound John pointed out. Upper right shoulder. Ribs. Twice in the stomach. Thighs. He hated werewolf magic, healing with undiluted poison, but he couldn’t heal her without it. He brushed the ash over the last of the wounds, pressing it in and looking away as her muscles seized once again with pain.

“I think that’s all,” John said quietly.

Stiles closed the bag and dropped it by the cave entrance, parting the roots so he could wash his burning hands in the violent rain. He wasn’t even a werewolf and it’d left red spots on his skin. He couldn’t imagine what _she_ was feeling…whoever she was. He closed the roots and sat facing them for a long moment, listening to the tearing wind outside. 

John draped a blanket over the woman and started digging through his bag for bandages and antiseptic potions Asher and Rosalva had given them. 

They silently took turns cleaning each other up; as Stiles had suspected, they’d both only suffered minor cuts and bruises, so they cleaned them and left them alone. Stiles examined the bruise on his hand, swelling his knuckles. Unless he suddenly mastered Asher’s ice cube spell, he highly doubted he’d be able to do anything but wait it out. He stretched and wiggled his fingers; painful, but possible. 

“I hope the tornadoes don’t collapse this,” John said quietly, gaze on the ceiling. 

“Oh, god.” Stiles’s chest clenched at the thought. He sat down off his heels and opened his hands in his lap, letting a shield bloom out over the three of them, the whole cave, fortifying the walls. 

It was small, just enough room for the woman to sprawl and John and Stiles to sit a safe distance from her. It was humid, too; as the rain dried on them, sweat began to gather. Stiles put his hand out and formed a flat, uneven ice mound, no higher than his ankle, standing.

It gave off a chill immediately. The problem, he reflected, would be keeping it from spreading and icing over the entire cave. 

“Do you know her?” John asked quietly.

Outside, thunder rumbled.

Stiles looked at her, baffled. “No, but I felt her, somehow. I have for a while.”

“That’s never happened before.”

“Nope.” Stiles rubbed the cuts on his cheek, wincing. “I dunno what’s going on with my powers,” he admitted with a long sigh. 

They fell back into uneasy silence, listening to the tornadoes wreak havoc outside. The walls seemed to shake with every roll of thunder, the air filled with the scent of ozone as lightning struck. Stiles strengthened the shield around them, hunching his shoulders. 

He pulled some food and water out of his bag eventually and set it near the woman; John did the same with a bar of soap and a couple of small towels. Stiles eyed her and found a pair of shorts and a shirt he was willing to share and set them with the other offerings. They didn’t have extra shoes, unfortunately. They really didn’t have much, but she had nothing, and they had enough to share. If she woke up. They might’ve been too late to stop the poison from killing her. 

She grunted sometime later, sitting up abruptly and swaying, the blanket pooling around her waist. “Oh god,” she slurred. “I feel awful.”

John spoke. He had a more soothing nature than Stiles. “There’s some food there for you. And water.”

She eyed the jars, but snatched them anyway, like she didn’t have the strength to be suspicious. She ate messily, like she was starving, while glaring at them. “Who’re you?” she asked with her mouth full.

He pressed down on a smile. “I’m John and this is Stiles, my son. Who’re you?”

“Cora.” She swallowed a cucumber slice whole, making a face as it went down. She had a lot of tangled, filthy dark hair falling around her. She looked a little like Tarzan. 

Stiles shook his head. He didn’t get it. “How old are you?”

She scowled, mouth moving as if she was counting while she fished another cucumber slice free. “I think twenty-five? Maybe.” She squinted at him. “How old are _you?_ ” 

“Twenty-one ish,” he muttered. She’d have been fifteen or so when the bombs went off. He hadn’t _known_ any fifteen year olds before. 

She moved on to the jar of fish. “How’d you know how to cure me?” she asked as she ate. 

“I learned a long time ago,” he mumbled. 

She just nodded. After eating, she gratefully cleaned up with the water she hadn’t gulped down, the rags, and the soap, and, although she clearly thought it was silly, she eventually put the clothes on that they’d given her. There was nothing to be done about her hair, so she hadn’t tried. She was still pale, her face almost glowing in the flashlight, sickly and thin.

“You should sleep more,” Stiles suggested while she was sniffing at the shirt she’d pulled over her head. 

She yawned fiercely. “Probably.” She plucked at the blanket, then the pants, and finally laid down, curling on her side. “Thank you,” she said, so softly they almost couldn’t hear it over the storm. 

After she started snoring, John frowned at Stiles. “It’s strange that you don’t know her.”

“No kidding.” Stranger still how _long_ he’d been sensing her. He could almost understand if he’d sensed her distress after she’d been poisoned, but he’d been feeling a connection to her long before they’d even arrived in the jungle. He winced as thunder roared. He could feel the wind battering at the roots shielding them, like pinching, pulling fingers trying to rip away the walls. “You should get some sleep too, Dad.” 

John shook his head. “ _You_ should sleep.”

“I can’t. I have to make sure this doesn’t get ripped off by the storm.”

John looked like he wanted to argue, then sighed. “Yeah, alright. But if the storm dies down, try to sleep. You didn’t sleep much last night and none before that.”

“I know, thank you for your concern.” He grinned. “I promise to go to sleep once the storm stops.”

“Good.”

Stiles did his usual nightly checks, although it was probably still evening—the tornado had made it seem like it was later than it actually was. He busied himself by examining Lydia and Boyd’s emotions; they were both feeling impatient and annoyed. He wondered what about, but he wouldn’t intrude further than their surface emotions to find out. He rubbed the cuff on his wrist, stretching his hand to keep it limber. 

The storm died down after a few hours, quieting to just a gentle patter of rain. Yawning, Stiles waved a hand at the roots, parting them so he could look around. 

There were broken branches and felled trees as far as he could see, the sparse grass and mud churned up in disarray. The air outside was cooler than it had been in days, pleasantly so. Stiles wanted to leave the roots parted for a breeze, so he started on the perimeter and camouflage spells he’d all but perfected at this point. Probably everything was hiding after that storm, but he didn’t want to chance them getting eaten in their sleep. 

Behind him, Cora let out a canine whimper and kicked her legs. Shuffling noises followed, another whimper. She yelped and sat up, breathing hard. 

Stiles got out another jar of fish and passed it over to her. 

“Thanks,” she rasped. “How is it not rotting?” she asked while he was digging around in his bag. 

“Magic. The jars have preservation spells on them.” He took a bag out and fumbled through for a container of medicine Rosalva and Asher had made. “Here, take this.”

“What is it?”

“It’s for soothing fevers. It should help you get some sleep, even if you metabolize it quickly.”

She eyed the paste. “Really? It doesn’t look like medicine.”

“Well, we had to make it ourselves.” He shrugged. “You don’t _have_ to take it. I should be saving it for my dad anyway, just in case.”

She shrugged. “If it makes it so I can sleep, I’ll take it.” She scooped it out with her finger and smeared it on her tongue. “Thanks.” She gulped it with a wince. 

Stiles rubbed his face and stretched out, resting his head on his backpack and staring at the top of the cave. 

After a few minutes, Cora let out a long, satisfied sigh. “Ooh, that’s better.” She shuffled around and laid back down.

Stiles bit his lip. “How long have you been alone?” he asked before he could change his mind. Being alone was dangerous these days. 

Cora swallowed audibly. “The whole time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! :D


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3

The tornadoes had ripped up several acres of trees, letting more sunlight in than Stiles had seen in days. The fallen and broken trees created a more difficult path, as far as he could tell, but at least it was well-lit. About fifteen feet from their cave, a crumbling hole in the ground had water running down the sides like waterfalls. Stiles couldn’t see where the water was coming from or what had made the hole. 

Cora leaned around his shoulder and let out a sigh right on the side of his head. “Well _that_ sucks.”

He glanced at her. “Where are your supplies?”

She looked over, frowning. “I don’t have any.”

Behind them, John stopped what he was doing. “Nothing?”

She looked back at him and nodded. “I’ve mostly just been living as a wolf, y’know?” She shrugged. “I didn’t keep anything.” She pointed at a scar on her chest, exposed by the too-long shirt she was wearing. “This isn’t the first time I’ve been on my deathbed.”

John frowned.

“Do you want to come with us?”

She shrugged again, her gaze dropping off to the side, shoulders lowering. She twisted her fingers in the hem of her borrowed shirt. 

Stiles looked back at John, but he knew he wanted to bring her, too. “Alright, then we should get moving while we’ve got sunlight.” He stood and stepped out of the cave, squinting in the sun. 

Navigating the mess turned out to be more like completing an obstacle course than a walk in the woods. They had to scale fallen trees or crawl under them depending on how wide around the trunks were or how sharp the leaves were. 

Cora scampered right under a tree with tangerine bark, pushing herself through with her bare feet and popping out muddy and whole on the other side. She had lots of extremely tangled brown hair and a narrow nose in the light of day, a familiar grin that Stiles couldn’t identify. She danced impatiently in place while John and Stiles scooted and wiggled their way under the tree. 

Stiles grimaced at the thick mud smeared down his front once he’d gotten free. 

“It would be easier if we _all_ had wolf forms,” she muttered. 

Stiles laughed, abruptly reminded of Ari. 

“What?”

He shook his head, still smiling. “Nothing. Sorry, but we’ve each only got two legs.”

She sighed theatrically. “I suppose that’ll have to do.” She leaped on top of a broken tree, balancing on her toes on a shard of wood as wide as she was tall. 

Cora moved through the jungle easily, comfortably, like she’d lived there her whole life, like she knew every corner of it, even with the disarray from the tornadoes. She…was like one of the animals stalking the shadows. 

Stiles knew she’d said she’d been alone the whole time, but did that mean since the bombs or her whole life? He couldn’t figure out how to ask, especially not when he had to watch his step so closely to avoid being maimed. “Are there a lot of storms like that here?” he asked while he climbed over a tangle of branches. 

Cora shrugged. “I guess? Not like _this_ , but there’s a lot of loud storms.” She flicked something off her arm and pointed at a wide, glossy trail over the ground about fifteen feet away. “Hold your breath when you step over that. And make sure not to step in it.”

“Why? What is it?” To Stiles it looked like a trail of clear sap smeared across the ground, heading east. 

“Anacondas make them.” 

John glanced at the trail, brows lifted. “You sure it’s an anaconda?”

She nodded, a smirk curving her mouth. “Yeah, my brother loved those movies, _Anaconda_ and _Anacondas_ , so I used to look up a lot of snake facts when I was like, twelve.”

Stiles nodded. She’d had a brother at some point, then. 

“Anyway, if you step in it or inhale over it, it’ll make you fall asleep so the snake can come back and eat you later.” She picked mud off the back of her arm. “Step over. Hold your breath.” She nodded and led the way. 

It seemed silly to take giant steps over an innocuous-looking trail in the dirt, but as they were moving over, Stiles could sense the danger, the poison coming off of it that would lull unsuspecting prey right to sleep.

“How’d you figure out about the slime?” John asked once Cora indicated they could breathe safely again.

“I saw a few animals pass out over them. Saw the anacondas come back and eat them.” She grinned and for a second, her teeth looked...strange, but then she was talking and facing away again. “I never got caught in it, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Yes,” John laughed, “that’s what I was wondering.”

She nodded, smug. “Not yet. Everything gets caught by something eventually.” She kept walking even when John slowed, sharing a sad look with Stiles. 

She wasn’t wrong, but it was still sad. Stiles supposed even a lone werewolf had pretty good odds out there, but it didn’t make Cora’s matter-of-fact acceptance of death any easier to hear. The air thickened as the day went on, the humidity rising with the sun. 

They walked the bank of a river for a while, but Cora wouldn’t let them fill their water jugs from it, tense and agitated the whole time but unwilling to explain. 

“We need water,” Stiles snapped at last. “We aren’t werewolves, we can’t just power through dehydration.”

She scowled at him. “I’m not asking you to. Just not _here,_ not _yet._ ”

“Why?” he demanded, throwing his hands up. 

She growled and ducked down, snatching up a hefty rock. She eyed the water, then flung it to the center of the river. It hit with a plop, barely making a splash. 

A razor-like fin cut through the water toward where the rock had gone down, then another, then three more, on and on until the water was churning. 

Stiles stepped back, stomach lurching with automatic fear. “Oh.”

“Yeah, _oh,_ ” she grumbled. “What, you think I can’t tell when it’s dangerous? I live here,” she scoffed. 

John looked up. “Where did you live before?” His voice was gentle, but Cora tensed like he’d shouted. 

“It doesn’t matter, it’s gone. It’s been gone for a long time.” She flapped a hand at the water. “This part of the river is infested with piranhas, but if we keep going, we’ll be able to get some water without risking our limbs.”

“Okay. Thank you.”

Cora studied John, like she was wondering if he would ask her again. She looked away after a moment and started walking.

John shook his head sadly. 

Stiles watched the piranhas for another few seconds before catching up to them. He felt damp all over, and the sweat running down his face was stinging the cuts he’d gotten the night before. He rubbed his face, nails catching on the fresh scabs, and tripped over a broken branch.

Cora laughed. 

Stiles jerked his hand and roots caught her ankle, sending her sprawling. 

She squawked as she fell, landing in a heap. “Jerk!” She threw a fistful of dirt at him. 

“You laughed at me first.” He brushed dirt off his chest, grinning, and held a hand out. “I won’t do it again.”

She let him help her up. “Sure.” She side eyed him while they walked. “So you can use, like, real magic? Anytime?” 

He sputtered a laugh. “ _Yeah,_ what did you think?”

“I don’t know! That you just made potions and stuff, you gave me that medicine last night.”

“I didn’t make that.”

She frowned. “Then who did?”

“A friend.”

Her eyes narrowed, then dropped. “Oh.”

“He’s not dead.” But he understood why she would think that. “They’re just…looking for people.”

She was confused, he could see it, but she didn’t ask for details. “Okay.”

It was nearly midday before they found a part of the river that Cora decided was safe to gather water from. Stiles purified it in the jugs while John filled them. Cora watched, fascinated, while the spell glowed over the water, leaving it clear and free of dirt and leaf particles, not to mention everything they couldn’t see. 

“Wow.” She grinned at him. “You’re like Brita-to-go.” 

“Ungrateful fuzz face,” he muttered. 

She let her face shift halfway and bared her fangs, flattish nose wrinkling, but it only made him laugh. She acted annoyed. Her nostrils twitched, face lifting to the faint breeze drifting by. “Ooh, wait.” She yanked her shirt over her head. 

“Why?” John asked, turning with the last water jug.

“Food,” Cora said simply, and dropped her pants. She shuddered and shifted into a deep brown wolf before leaping over a fallen tree and into a tangle of thorns. 

Stiles stared at the crumpled pile of clothes, then looked at John. “She’s excited,” he said, baffled. 

John set the last jug with the other three. “Wolf’s got to hunt, I suppose.”

Stiles crouched again to purify it. The leaves above them rustled. He threw his hands up automatically, but nothing fell from above. Just the wind. He looked at the bruise on the back of his right hand, grimacing; it was deep gray, a shadow that would likely be blue and purple the next day. 

The felled tree behind them creaked; Cora clambered over it human shaped, filthy with caked-on mud and blood spilled down her front, starting at her mouth. 

She lifted a brown deer over the log and let it fall with a thump, grinning at Stiles and John. “Dinner!” She tilted her head back, studying the sky. “Or lunch, I guess.”

Stiles winced. “Ah…great. Thanks.”

John sighed and went to her. “Stiles, start a fire. Cora, why don’t you help me skin it? Do you need a knife?”

“Nope.”

Stiles turned away hastily. As much death as he’d seen and even dealt lately, he still couldn’t handle blood if it wasn’t in the heat of battle. It was just gross. He used magic to pull rocks from the ground, one at a time, basically the same size, both to distract himself and to put around the fire he was going to start. It wasn’t enough to distract from the wet noises behind him or Cora chattering away about her favorite parts to eat, but it was all he had. He set the rocks in a loose circle and lurched to his feet like a drunken puppet. “Going to get some sticks, mostly to avoid-” he waved his hand “-all that, so please continue without me.” He hurried up the river a little, following where they’d come from.

Sticks and leaves were easy to come by, though they were all damp. As long as his magical fire had a place to sit and tinder to devour, it should heat up just fine damp or not. The real issue was containment, but he was pretty sure he had that handled. 

By the time he returned, Cora and John had finished with the deer and Cora had pulled the clothes back on. Stiles dumped the sticks he’d gathered in the rock pile and flicked his fingers at them. 

Fire sputtered to life, a blaze two feet above his head before he managed to calm it down to a respectable campfire. 

John rearranged things and set some meat in the pan he still carried around with his supplies. 

Cora crossed her legs and grabbed a raw hunk, ripping into it with her teeth. 

Stiles realized that her teeth were sharp, fang-shaped, and had been all day—that was why her smile seemed off, but she’d been holding her lips so the sharp tips of the fangs weren’t visible. He wondered if she kept them like that consciously or if it was just another way for her to survive. He turned his attention away, discomfited, and reached out for Lydia and Boyd. 

Lydia was uneasy about something and vaguely annoyed; Boyd was summoning the dead. 

Stiles rocked back slightly; he hadn’t realized he’d be able to sense that so clearly, but there it was, their connection shot through with soft black smoke as Boyd called out for ghosts, checking for any signs of their friends, reassuring himself that they were still alive somewhere. 

Boyd had turned out to be a necromancer, some hidden family power that’d saved him from the bombs that’d killed most other humans. 

Stiles was so grateful that his friends, people both he and John considered family, had survived what had killed almost everyone else, even though it’d changed their lives. He hadn’t protected them himself, but the guilt was easier to live with, knowing they’d survived anyway. He turned his attention to the Hales and was unsurprised to feel them so strongly he could almost see them. Something about his connection to them made the tethers powerful.

Laura was alert while the other two slept and felt…content. Wherever they were going, they were all in agreement, and it pleased her. Her pack felt uplifted to her, and that was reassuring, calming. 

Stiles wished he could see what Della was doing just as easily. His hand curled around the cuff, squeezing until the edges dug into his skin. He wanted to be sure she wasn’t going after the Hales, but he couldn’t risk it. They weren’t out at sea any longer, where the ocean confused Della’s psychic magic. She would find them easily here. 

After eating, Stiles put the fire out and left a marker for the others, brushing mud off his pants. 

“You’re _familiar,_ ” Cora declared as they began walking, bumping into John’s side. “Isn’t that weird?” She didn’t seem too concerned about it, her voice blasé, face relaxed.

“It’s very weird. Maybe we knew each other before,” Stiles suggested, watching her out of the corner of his eye. 

She shrugged, clambering on top of a log and holding her hand out for John. “Dunno. I don’t like to talk about before,” she added in a warning tone. She held a hand out for Stiles next. 

He wanted to know, but could tell she was serious. She wouldn’t talk about the past, or she wouldn’t stick around. He would rather they stay together, no matter why he felt that way. He let her pull him up. Maybe she’d let things slip without him having to push. He’d just have to be patient. Something he was…absolutely…known for. 

“Still going the right way?” John asked. 

“Yep.” Stiles twisted his fingers; ice spikes thudded into a tree to his left. Ice began spreading from the spikes, slowly encasing the tree. “Still a long way off.”

“Figures.”

Stiles turned to look over his shoulder, frowning.

Cora had slowed at some point, falling behind. 

“What?”

“There’s the river again.” She crossed her arms and caught up. “It’s dangerous.”

“We won’t have to swim through it.”

She just shook her head. 

It was fast moving and wide, churning white and roaring. Rocks jutted out in some places, logs racing between them. The noise was incredible. It also cut straight across where they needed to get to. 

Cora pointed. “It isn’t safe. We have to find a way around.” She looked east, then west, and her face fell when all she saw was more water. 

“We’ll just go over it,” Stiles said with confidence he didn’t feel. He might be able to make a bridge…or just send ice spreading through the jungle like a plague. He put his hands out, flicked his fingers, and exhaled. 

The ice spread in front of him and arched over the water—not high enough for Stiles’s tastes—to the other side, stretching further into the trees than he’d intended, slicking over the ground in a sparkling white sprawl. 

Cora blinked at it, then poked it with her toes. She hissed and skipped back. “It hurts!”

“Oh, fuck, sorry. I forgot you don’t have shoes.”

She scowled. “How?” She bit her lip, gaze darting to the water. “I can run. I’ll be okay.”

“No, you’ll get frostbite.” Stiles swung his backpack off. “Maybe a couple layers of socks would protect you long enough to get across?”

She shrugged. “Maybe.”

John looked wary, but he didn’t offer an alternative. 

“Here.” Stiles dug out two pairs of socks, both stiff from air drying in a sea breeze, and passed them over. 

Cora examined them, nose twitching at the scent of homemade soap, before she put them on clumsily, like she’d forgotten how.

A splash made Stiles look up. He couldn’t see anything other than the rapids, the frothy white crests of water churning over jutting rocks. Maybe something had fallen in and gotten swept away. 

“Let’s go.” Cora wiggled her toes in the socks. “If we go fast, these should protect me.” 

“Right.”

The bridge was a bit slippery and so cold Stiles could feel it through his boots. He didn’t blame Cora for jogging ahead of them; the socks stuck slightly with each step, slowing her the further she got.

John slipped. 

Stiles caught his arm and pulled him away from the edge, swallowing panic.

“Thanks. We-”

Water sprayed over their backs, splashing over the bridge and freezing in uneven peaks and valleys. 

Ice spread. 

Stiles shoved John forward and turned. 

A black feline—a jaguar, maybe—had jumped on the bridge, bright yellow eyes locked on them. Its tail was long and flat on the end, like a fin, and it had gills on its side, algae trailing over its back like a cloak. “Run, Dad,” Stiles ordered, backing up carefully. 

The jaguar tensed, shoulders bunching to leap.

Cora whimpered. 

Stiles turned, sensing her distress. 

She and John pulled unsuccessfully at her foot, which was stuck to the ice. The socks were stuck a few feet away, frozen in the puddle the jaguar had made. 

Stiles backed toward them, watching the jaguar lick its jaws. “You guys run.”

“Um, _trying_ ,” Cora snarled. 

Stiles rolled his eyes and threw a hand out behind him.

Flames blazed down the bridge, melting a groove through the middle, all the way to Cora. She yelped when it burned around her foot, and a second later, shouted in victory. 

Stiles clenched his fists. 

The bridge cracked like a bone snapping. The jaguar leaped. 

Stiles threw his hands out. 

The jaguar flew backwards, landing in a heap on the cracking ice.

Stiles put his hands together and flung them apart. 

The ice shattered at the far end. The destruction raced toward the jaguar and Stiles.

Stiles finally turned his back and ran, racing to Cora and John on the other end. He jumped to the dirt, landed with a wobble, and turned. 

The ice crumbled, swept away by the fast moving river and taking the jaguar with it. 

“Cool,” Cora said loudly. She was leaning on John, left foot held off the ground while the burns healed. 

Stiles grimaced. “Sorry about that.”

She waggled her foot. “Hey, at least I didn’t have to chew it off.” She set it down gingerly, rocking her weight to check if she could stand on it. She looked pleased when she could, danced a little in place in a way that reminded Stiles of a happy dog. 

Not that he would tell her that. He looked back at the river, worried, but if he could find a way over it, Asher could too. He put his hands out and created a marker. 

“What’re you doing?” Cora asked. 

Stiles shook his head. “Nothing, we should keep moving.” He waited until they started walking away to look at his hands, the flames jumping between his fingers, licking up his arms, twisting and curling. He clenched them into fists and followed, willing the fire back, down, out of sight. 

They were waiting for him by a tree with bright green bark. Cora pointed at a nest in the tangled branches. “They’re territorial,” she whispered. “But if we run, we should make it.” 

“Can’t we go around?” 

She shook her head and pointed at the next tree over. More nests, in every tree in sight. “We’ll just have to run a little.” She held her fingers an inch apart. 

John shrugged at Stiles. 

“Just protect your head,” Cora said seriously, half crouching. “Go.”

As soon as they crossed between two trees, a bird cawed ferociously and close by. Stiles couldn’t help turning his head, twisting, following the noise of flapping wings until he spotted it.

Its bill gleamed, metallic, in the sparse sunlight, sharpened to a dangerous point. There were six of them, weaving expertly through the tree branches in their pursuit. 

“Tou-toucans,” Stiles gasped. “ _Toucans?_ ”

“They’re dangerous,” Cora warned him. “Keep running.” She yelped when one swooped at her, cutting open her shoulder. 

Stiles punched his fist out. The spell missed and hit a branch. Leaves and bark exploded down at them as the bird swooped safely away. Something sharp clipped his shoulder. He hunched, throwing his hands up and shielding himself. 

The bird squawked when it hit the shield, thrown several feet by the repellent magic. 

They ran until the birds’ calls were faint, nearly gone. Stiles was bleeding in several places, John too, and they were all gasping, hearts drumming wildly. It was getting dark and Stiles was exhausted, filthy with sweat. 

Cora wiped her face. “Where are we going?” she asked out of the blue. 

“What?”

“You said we couldn’t go around the river.” She scratched dried blood off her arm. “So that means you’re trying to go somewhere.”

Stiles, still trying to catch his breath, nodded. “We’re…yeah, we’re trying to go somewhere.” He sucked in a breath, willing the stitch in his side away. “There’s this…place, somewhere here, run by a witch everyone calls the Queen of the South. Supposedly it’s a settlement, a place people go to live.” He rubbed his face, palms sliding through sweat and grime. “There’s another witch, whose name is Della, but people call her the Ice Witch or the Ice Queen, I don’t know…She’s trying to destroy the settlement so no one has a safe place to live. We’re going so we can warn the Queen of the South she’s coming.”

“Huh.” Cora giggled, making his head snap up. “They sound like characters from the Wizard of Oz.”

Stiles couldn’t help smiling a little. “Yeah, I guess so.”

She pursed her lips. “So you’re _just_ going to warn the queen about the witch?”

Phrased like that, it sounded like a faerie tale quest. One where people like Stiles were usually the bad guys. “We plan to stay if we can, to help if Della attacks.”

She nodded. “Cool.”

John looked between them. “We need to find a place to sleep for the night.”

“It’s not all the way dark yet,” Cora observed. “We have time.” She kicked a branch out of her way, sent it flying into a tree, where it snapped on impact. 

Stiles wondered if all beta werewolves were that casually strong. He should’ve appreciated Derek’s self-control more, then realized he was thinking about him and shouldn’t have been, and cleared his throat. “Do you-” he began. 

Cora shushed him, leaning forward on the balls of her feet. She was abruptly on alert, every muscle tense. She flicked her claws out, shoulders moving as she shifted. 

“What now?” John breathed. It had been a long day. 

Stiles cast his senses out.

Elves.

He swore under his breath and tugged John left, behind a tree. He reached for Cora.

She skittered out of reach and joined them on her own. Her face melted back to human, except her teeth. “ _Elves._ We can’t stay.” She tilted her head back, gaze darting as she scanned the canopy. “There.” She pointed to a cluster of brown and dull pink leaves, topping deep blue trunks. 

“Why-”

“Just come on, we have to climb.” She marched away, moving swiftly and silently over the leaf litter. 

Stiles and John had to settle for quick but loud. Cora scaled the tree like she was made for it; Stiles helped John, and John reached back to help him. The bark was coarse like sandpaper and burned their palms and knees as they followed Cora into the leaves, which were soft as flower petals. 

Stiles pushed a branch out of his way and found Cora in the middle of a nest made of branches bigger than Stiles was tall; the nest was littered with leaves and smaller sticks, and big enough to hold the three of them, though Stiles was worried about it holding their weight. 

“Nothing lives here,” Cora said. “Smells abandoned.”

“Uh-huh.” Stiles tested it, carefully, but it felt sturdy enough. He swallowed and climbed in, eyes squeezed shut, but it didn't even sway. 

John joined them. “Are you sure it’s abandoned? I don’t want to meet the bird that needs this big of a nest.” 

Yeah, they’re gone.” She peered over the edge, through the leaves, and pointed. 

John and Stiles joined her. 

Twelve or thirteen elves paraded by, carrying weapons and wolfsbane, talking in terse undertones. 

Between John and Stiles, Cora shivered, swallowing audibly. 

Stiles put his hand on her shoulder and camouflaged them, layering shields and protections on top of their hideout. 

As the elves moved out of sight, Stiles’s body suddenly figured out they were safe-ish and not moving. It was all he could do to lay down before his eyes slid closed. He tumbled into dreams as vibrant and dangerous as everything else around them.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you're enjoying the tale as much as I enjoyed writing it! :D

Lydia crossed her arms, mouth pressed into a thin white line. She didn’t like the guy Ari was trying to recruit; he made her skin crawl just looking at him and she was halfway across the deck. He had buzzed short hair with an old scar running along his scalp, but that didn’t mean much—look at Wyatt. Everyone had ridiculous scars now, but this guy…She inhaled sharply. He had death all over him like a heavy fog, clinging to his clothes, making his smile seem sinister. 

Boyd lightly touched her elbow. “He’s got ghosts all over,” he muttered. 

Lydia wasn’t surprised. Her jaw ached from clenching it so hard. 

The guy was a kinetic, but he wouldn’t say what kind, playing coy, trying to coax an invitation to the ship. 

Ari was already backing off, dismissing him as an option. Her back was curved slightly, which probably made her seem weak to the kinetic, but Lydia knew she was fighting the urge to erupt into scales and literally bite his head off. Ari had been struggling against her shift for a while, especially since setting fire to an elven fleet a couple days ago. She gave off such heat that things around her melted if Asher wasn’t there to shield them. 

The guy smirked and leaned back, sprawling in his chair.

They needed an army, Lydia reflected, but they couldn’t win if they got their throats slit in their sleep. She wanted to scream. He’s bad. He’s death. He ought to know the _pain-_

Boyd touched her shoulder and she remembered herself. 

She inhaled through her nose, jaw locked together. She knew Ari would get rid of this man; they just needed the right moment. Her gaze drifted aside. 

They’d managed to gather three people, three fighters, since they’d left Stiles and John behind. Just three, and the days were passing quickly. At this rate, they would fail. Two weeks would come and go and John and Stiles would face Della alone. They would lose them again.

Her hands clenched. She still didn’t know why the urge to scream hit her like it did, when there were no bodies, no dead or dying. She’d learned to weaponize it and resist it when she needed to, barely, but the knowledge of what she was and what she could do, the why of it, was long lost. 

Three fighters. A succubus who fed off of affection named Natasha. JC Gentry, a kinetic who could manipulate but not create metal. Ula was a photokinetic, manipulating and creating light. She only spoke French and could only communicate so far with Jamel, who was fluent.

“So, what’s in this for me?” the man asked, drumming his fingers on his leg. “If I help with whatever you’ve got in mind? And what is it, by the way, you didn’t really explain.”

Ari shrugged, disinterested. “Nothing, really. We don’t have much compensation.”

He scowled. “Well, I need some supplies and you said you had some.”

“Sorry,” she said, “I can’t help you.”

“I see.” He turned his head, looking out at the sea. His jaw flexed. A roar filled their ears, crumbling Lise and Alden to the deck immediately. 

Lise’s gun skidded across the metal, knocking into Jamel’s boot. 

Boyd clapped his hands over his ears, bent double, gasping.

The roar rose in pitch, high, piercing, painful.

Ari covered her head with a roar. 

Everyone was stuck.

Lydia _knew_ he couldn’t be trusted. She covered her ears, staying up right through sheer force of will.

The man sauntered by, winking, on his way to Lise’s dropped gun.

Lydia caught him by the arms and yanked him off balance, close to her as if to kiss him. She unleashed the scream that’d been building since he’d boarded the boat, right in his face, jaw wrenching open at last, at last, at last. 

He flinched. 

The roaring stopped.

Lydia kept screaming. 

Asher ran over, wincing as he neared Lydia’s scream, and grabbed the kinetic by the head. 

His eyes rolled back and he collapsed, nearly taking Lydia with him until she remembered to let go.

She cut herself off, gasping. 

“What _was_ that?” Wyatt demanded, rubbing his ears. 

“He’s an audiokinetic,” Asher replied, disgruntled. “We’re lucky Lydia managed to surprise him. He’d have been able to stop her scream if he wanted.” 

She rubbed her throat, uncomfortable. Her only real weapon in this world and there was something—someone out there who could stop her from using it. Perfect. She moved away, shoulders slumping. 

Boyd followed her. “That was quick work, good job.”

“Thanks.” She glanced back at Ari and Ripley, who were discussing what to do with the guy. _Dump him overboard,_ she thought. _Let the sea take him. Let the mermaids eat him._ But that was just her fear talking. She wanted to be untouchable. 

He wasn’t the only audiokinetic out there, anyway. Killing him wouldn’t protect her. 

“We’ll just make a quick pit stop, then try somewhere else,” Ari announced. 

Jamel eyed the unconscious kinetic with disgust. “Maybe we should throw him overboard.”

Lydia smiled at him and he smiled back; he had a charming grin that she’d always appreciated. 

Ari looked thoughtful.

“We can’t,” Asher said firmly. “Because we aren’t murderers.”

“We’ve killed plenty,” Ari pointed out.

“When our lives were being threatened.”

Lydia turned away. He would’ve killed them if he had the chance, but it _would_ be different, she supposed, since he wasn’t technically an active threat. She still didn’t like it.

“Fine,” Ari huffed. “We stick to the original plan of dumping him on land, unconscious or not. He’s not our problem and he did try to steal from us, at best.”

Asher nodded. 

Lydia let out a breath and went to the stairs. She looked up at Boyd when he followed her, the man who’d become like a brother to her, her best friend, who’d followed a ghost to find her alone and half mad in the remains of San Francisco, listening to the calls of the dead. Tears filled her eyes. “I hope we find them,” she whispered. 

Boyd sat beside her. “We will.”

They had to. They’d promised Stiles they would find everyone. Erica. Jackson. Scott. Danny. Melissa. They were alive somewhere out there and they probably thought John, Stiles, Boyd, and Lydia were dead, maybe each other, too. They could be fighting for their lives, alone and barely surviving. 

Boyd took her hand as the boat began moving.

She squeezed her free hand into a fist and tried not to feel hopeless. They needed an army, and so they would find an army.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! This is probably weird. But I am actively trying to improve my descriptions, especially of people and surroundings (settings?) so hey, if you feel like it, let me know if I've improved or if you liked the way I described something! I've noticed in my writing that I don't really describe characters very much, so that's something I was/am actively working on in this series (describing in a subtle, informative but not overwhelming/annoying way) and I'm anxious enough about it to babble hahahahah! Anyway, I hope you enjoy the story either way!!

Rain pattered gentle and steady, pulling Stiles from sticky, confusing nightmares. He felt relaxed and sleepy, his body heavy. He could just burrow his face deeper into his pillow and sleep a little longer, listening to the rain on the window. A drop hit his face. The rain grew heavier, louder, and more drops plunked against his cheeks. He frowned. Leaky roof? He would have to get that…His eyes snapped open, spotting the pink and brown leaves above, drooping under the weight of the rain. 

John and Cora were packing up around him.

He sat up and found himself covered in dirt and sticks. He yawned. He must have slept hard to be that confused as he woke up.

Cora said, “You were sleep talking,” in lieu of a good morning. 

“At least I wasn’t doing magic.” He stretched, wincing as his sore muscles pulled, then grabbed his backpack, shaking out the dent where his head had been. He sipped some water and cast his senses, but it seemed like they were alone for the moment.

“We should go before this thing fills with water,” John suggested. 

They clambered awkwardly out of the nest and out of the tree; Cora jumped over the edge and landed in an awkward tumble, rolling to her feet with dirt and sticks stuck to her clothes. She held her arms out and bowed. 

“You could’ve broken your neck,” John pointed out.

She pouted. “But I didn’t. And it was cool.”

“Super cool.” Stiles gave her a thumbs up.

She grinned. 

“Don’t encourage her!”

Stiles flicked his fingers at the tree, leaving a marker. He stared at it for a moment, studying the swirling flames. He hoped Asher and the others found them safely. 

John and Cora bickered about whether she should be allowed to leap out of trees or not. John was leaning toward _not._

Stiles started walking, splaying his hands out. He needed to practice more magic, so he was prepared for whatever Della might have in store for them, let alone the mysterious Queen of the South. He would practice what he knew first, and work from there. He plucked rocks from the ground as he walked, hovering them behind him like a row of ducklings. 

“Whoa, cool.” Cora caught up, swatting at the trail. “What other magic can you do?”

He snorted and turned his hands out, hurling the rocks into trees, cracking against bark. He smirked at her, then pulled roots up in front of them, straightening them out until they formed a wall. 

Cora raced up to them, leaning forward on her toes to examine them without touching. 

They were almost as thick around as her arm, swaying above her head, trailing smaller, thinner roots like hair. 

Stiles flicked his fingers. 

The roots parted like a curtain, bending as if they were bowing her by. 

She laughed and pranced through, then made a show of curtsying. 

Stiles smiled to himself. He glanced back at John automatically and found him frowning at the ground as he walked. 

“What else can you do?” Cora asked, running into Stiles’s side. 

He caught himself and grinned. “Let’s see…” He cast around for something poisonous; a tangle of brilliant blue bramble twenty feet ahead would do. He held his hand out, palm up, fingers down, and pushed. 

The withering spell took a second, shimmering, before it wrapped around the bramble. The blue faded first, then the bramble wilted, deflating like an old balloon. It turned brown, then gray, the scent of wet, dying foliage filling the air. 

“Can you do that to _people?_ ”

“I haven’t tried yet. Maybe.”

She toed the remains, face twisting when they crumbled. “Bet those elves would do that. They smell kind of like plants.”

“Probably.” He was thinking of other spells to try out when Cora went tense. 

She waved a hand at them, head tilted. 

A leopard crept by barely a second later, its body rippling in the shade. It didn’t seem to be paying them any attention, stalking past with tension in its long, gold and black tail. Its coat rippled again. 

Stiles couldn’t muffle his gasp.

The eyes all over the leopard’s body, the ones he’d mistaken for _spots_ , opened, focusing in his direction. 

Cora leaned forward, claws extending from her fingertips. 

The leopard blinked its many eyes at them and continued on its way. 

Stiles looked at John.

He watched it go with his mouth open, one hand resting limply on his gun.

“At least it didn’t seem interested in us,” Stiles offered weakly. 

“Who wants to hunt when you can get poked in the eye from every angle?” Cora shuddered. 

The leopard put them on their guard again, falling quiet as they trudged through the mud, trees, and roots. The bark changed to black and red, cracked and emitting heat like magma rocks. The leaves above were brittle and curled, brown, while snow-white ash drifted down over their heads. There was no smoke, just heat and ash, and the scent of burning wood. 

Cora held her hand out, gathering ash in her palm. “It’s cold.” She blew it at Stiles. “See?”

It _was_ cold, like snow, but it smeared black across his fingers like ash.

John touched one of the tree trunks with his fingertips, wincing at the heat. The ground beneath them was dry and cracked, impervious to the rain from earlier, the roots red hot where they were poking above the surface. 

The heavy silence over them was impenetrable. Stiles couldn’t think of a single thing to say, so he didn’t say anything. He marveled at both the trees and his own response to them. He could feel his own fire, his magic, twisting inside, yearning to flash out and burn. Before, he’d been so fascinated by everything, he’d wanted to document and study it, keep a record of everything. After traveling through it, almost non-stop, his enthusiasm had faded. He still wanted to record the things around them. He was just too tired to long for it _now._ Later. He’d do it later. 

“There’s water over there,” Cora said, swallowing the last of one jug. “We should refill, right?”

“Right.”

They followed her lead to a river, possibly just another branch of the same one they kept happening across, flowing south. About fifteen feet across, the water was churning and foaming as a swarm of piranhas fed on something unfortunate enough to have crossed their paths. They seemed bigger than Stiles thought they’d be. 

Cora shook her head. “They’re electrified, be careful.”

Stiles groaned. “Can’t there just be vicious teeth and _no_ electrical powers?” 

“Apparently not.” John set his hands on his hips. He looked better than he had earlier, more alert, his eyes clearer. Maybe he’d just been tired. “Stiles, why don’t you shield this part here,” he pointed, “so we can gather water and avoid getting shocked?”

“Good idea,” he replied slowly.

“Yes, I’ve heard I’m known to have a few of those.”

Stiles crossed his eyes at him and grinned when he laughed. He and John gathered the water in the shield while Cora kept a look out. Or, she said she was, but when Stiles glanced up from the water, she was leaning over a boulder, studying something that was giving off green light.

“Look.” She pointed with a stick.

A large frog—what once might’ve been a poison dart frog but was now the size of a baseball—sat glowing on the boulder, blinking purple eyes and secreting poison onto the stone like it’d sprung a leak. 

“Don’t touch it.”

She rolled her eyes. “Obviously.” She stepped back and tossed the stick aside. “Are we ready?”

“Yes.” Stiles glanced back at John.

He was studying the piranhas, which were winding down. Whatever they’d been eating was completely gone. 

Stiles cast his senses. He could still feel that pulse, the one he was sure was the settlement, and hoped he was right. He left a marker for the others and set off with Cora and John.

“So why are we going to this settlement? Couldn’t we just make our own?” Cora asked. “And hide from the wicked witch?”

“We…maybe, but we still have to tell the Queen of the South that she’s going to try to kill her and everyone there.”

“Why?”

John looked over. “Because we know and she doesn’t, and the Queen is about to be ambushed. If we did nothing, we’d be as responsible for their deaths.”

Cora nodded thoughtfully. “But _then_ couldn’t we go hide somewhere? Stiles is strong enough to hide us.” She didn’t say it like a compliment, somehow flat and dismissive. She might as well have said, “Stiles can tie his own shoes.”

“Well,” he twisted the cuff on his arm, “well, there are supposed to be a bunch of other witches there, and I need help.”

A macaw swooped down and flew in front of them. It landed in the branches ahead, trailing soft white tail feathers. It had lovely pale pink and purple plumage and a brown beak, which it opened and began to sing from. The melody was cheerful and uplifting, lively and fun. 

“Help with what?” Cora asked, tearing her gaze from the bird. 

The macaw hopped from tree to tree as they walked, following them with its cheery music. 

Stiles lifted his arm. “The witch, Della, put a tracking curse on me, and I can’t get it off, so unless I have this thing on, she can follow me. I’m hoping a big enough group of witches might be able to get it off instead.”

Cora eyed the cuff. 

The macaw’s singing grew louder in the silence. 

“Why don’t you cut it off?” she asked. 

Stiles winced. “I already tried.” He glanced guiltily at John.

He glared back, stone-faced. 

“Why didn’t it work?” Cora was oblivious to John’s fury. 

“She’s, um, too much stronger than me.”

“Oh.” She looked up at the bird, then back at Stiles. “So you just have to get stronger.”

He laughed, startled. “Yeah, I guess.” He rubbed his eyes. “Anyway, the cuff keeps her from tracking me down, so I’m stuck with it until we find a way to get rid of the curse.”

“True love’s kiss,” Cora simpered, making John sputter a laugh. She grinned, proud of herself. 

The macaw swooped down to perch on John’s shoulder, still singing.

Stiles couldn’t help laughing; he sang with it, matching its tones as well as he could, which wasn’t as good, but fun. Cora joined him and the bird bobbed its head to the beat. 

“Ugh, I’m getting hungry,” Stiles grumbled. 

The macaw stopped singing abruptly, leaving ringing silence in its place. 

“Sorry,” Stiles whispered, rubbing his ear. He chanced a look at the bird and found it looking around in a way that could only be described as frantic. 

Cora inhaled. 

The bird launched off of John’s shoulder, straight at the ground, and turned, with a _puff_ , into a spindly clump of flowers. 

Cora turned, snarling. A knife thudded into her shoulder, knocking her back. 

Stiles spun in time to see three elves with short, blue hair step out of the trees behind them, armed with knives and swords. Another crouched in the branches above, holding blue-tinted chains sparking with spellwork. 

John took his gun out.

“Back up,” Stiles ordered. 

Cora grunted as she pulled the knife from her shoulder. “Can’t. We’re surrounded.”

Stiles jerked his head around. He swore. His hands tingled; flames danced in his palms. He clenched his jaw. 

The elf in the branches leaped, boots first, at Stiles. 

He tripped backwards, hands rising.

Cora lunged, tackling her before she could make contact. 

Stiles twisted and threw his hands out. Roots shot from the ground. 

An elf with glowing magenta eyes stepped up, hands out. 

The roots swayed, ignoring both Stiles and the elf’s commands. 

He swallowed and turned his left hand out. Clenched it.

Bone crunched. The elf crumpled like a paper bag, blood gushing from her eyes, nose, and ears. 

Power surged in him like a fanned flame. He dropped his head back, breathing through it as fire raced up his arms.

A body slammed into his. Hands yanked his wrists behind his back. 

He kicked, the heel of his boot striking something. He threw his head back, slamming into a nose with force that made his vision sway. He ran forward when the elf released him with a shout. 

Four of the remaining elves circled him. 

Stiles sliced his hand through the air. 

Two elves to his right toppled into bloody pieces. 

He shuddered as power flared inside, feeding on lives. Fire danced up to his shoulders and down past his fingertips, crackling and snapping. He sliced the other two and laughed quietly to himself as his head spun with giddy power. 

John cursed. 

Stiles turned, lifting his hand to blast. He hesitated, gaze catching on the fire twisting through his fingers. He twisted his wrist instead, shot lightning at the elf kicking John.

John shot another while the first was frying. 

Cora snarled. She’d shifted and was fighting with her teeth, blood gleaming in her coat.

Stiles looked as three more elves ran at him. He clenched both hands. 

Two folded up like bloody accordions. A giddy smile tugged at his mouth. 

The last rushed at him. She clamped her hands on his shoulders. Roots wrapped tightly around his ankles, slithering up like constricting snakes. 

He put his hands on either side of her head and electrocuted her. Smoke poured from her ears and eyes until she collapsed. The roots kept crawling up and tightening after she fell. Stiles twisted and squirmed, breathing hard, as flames and roots twisted up his body. His right leg came free and he stumbled, balance thrown. 

“Stiles!” John gasped. 

He turned and saw an elf standing over his father, boot on his chest, poised to strike. His mouth twisted. He hurled air sharpened to invisible blades and watched, satisfied, as they cut through the elf. He groaned involuntarily as the roots tightened around his leg, halfway up his thigh now. He saw Cora on the ground, sides heaving, eyes shut, and strained toward her. He ripped at the roots with his hands, to no avail. He tried the spell he’d used to help John, but the magic bounced right off. 

An elf with cold hands yanked his arms behind his back, kicking his right knee so he was even more unbalanced. A blade touched the right side of his neck.

He lunged in the opposite direction instinctively and realized his mistake too late. The roots tightened. He twisted to correct himself.

His leg snapped with an audible _crack_.

Stiles screamed as pain jolted through him, one overwhelming wave after another. Magic burst out of him, everything he’d gathered from the elves’ lives shooting out. Fire arrowed through the elves’ chests and incinerated the roots as it enveloped Stiles like a burning shield. He collapsed and shouted again as the movement jolted his broken leg. The fire went out with a cloud of smoke. 

Sharp pain enveloped his left thigh. He couldn’t move, couldn’t think, the pain was all he knew. 

“What do we do?” Cora’s high, panicked voice broke through the red haze in his mind. 

“Not—his femur—walk…”

Stiles drifted. He wouldn’t make it far with a broken leg. He’d wondered about that before, hadn’t he? He felt a cold, shaking hand on his face, wiping away tears. 

John’s voice was briefly clear. “Brace yourself.”

Stiles wondered for what, except then he didn’t understand words. He wasn’t a person any longer, just painpainpain. And then nothing. When he opened his eyes, the leaves above were blurry. Pain still zipped up and down his leg like someone was stabbing him. He tried to sit up. 

Hands caught at his shoulders. 

He tensed, ready to fight-

“Don’t move just yet,” Cora sniffled. “He’s almost done and then you can have water.” She leaned over so he could see her face. She was filthy again, her face streaked with mud and blood and tear tracks. 

Stiles couldn’t talk; the pain in his leg kept his jaw clenched tight. 

When John came up a minute later, he helped Stiles sit up and have water, bits of food.

Stiles stared at his leg. It was being held straight-ish by rough pieces of wood and a few ripped pieces of clothing. 

“Rosalva had some painkillers in the kit she gave us.” John’s face was white as bone, his eyes wide and gleaming. He dug out the painkillers and gave them to Stiles, watching him closely. 

Stiles took them without a word. It took a while to kick in, but Cora and John never complained. He was sweaty and the pain was still coming in heavy waves, but he could think again once they kicked in. He thought…he was screwed. He couldn’t walk like this, let alone run. 

John put a hand on his arm. “We’ll just have to go slow,” he said, as if guessing what Stiles was thinking.

Cora simply looked sympathetic, like she was about to offer to put him out of his misery. 

Stiles cleared his throat. “We should move, before more elves find us.” His gaze drifted to the bodies. 

They all had holes burned through their chests, weirdly neat and circular for Stiles’s magic. 

“We’re resting. We’ll be fine here for a few.” John squeezed his arm. 

They sat in silence akin to a deathbed vigil. Stiles stared at his broken leg and wondered if it was.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D It's very cold, and so I think we all deserve this x)

The second dose of expired painkillers dulled the sharpest edge of the pain as the sun was setting. It didn’t completely take it away, but Stiles could move, so he insisted that they did. The brace kept his leg as still as possible, but it wasn’t as if they could risk setting the bone— _if_ they even knew how—without the risk of making it worse. 

“Stiles, maybe a little longer-”

“We can’t sit here all night,” he said through his teeth. “We could be eaten. Remember the crocodile?”

“We should find shelter, at least,” Cora agreed. She still had blood on her shoulder, but the wound had healed, thankfully. 

“Fine,” John sighed. 

“Great.” Stiles looked around, daunted by the idea of standing up.

Cora grabbed him under the arms and lifted him straight up, despite his being several inches taller than her, and set him gingerly on his feet. 

He grabbed John’s arm convulsively, hissing harsh breaths through his teeth to ride out the pain. Tears gathered in his eyes. He blinked them back, reminding himself that he could cry later, when they were safely tucked away from predators. 

“Here.” Cora hauled his arm over her shoulders, tugging him onto her with an arm around his waist, making herself into a short but resilient crutch. “Don’t worry,” she said solemnly, “I’ll just drop you if I have to fight.”

Stiles laughed. “Thanks.” He jerked his chin. “We’re going that way.”

Cora hummed and began walking. 

The last dregs of amusement drained as soon as Stiles took a step. Even with the brace and Cora’s help keeping him from putting much pressure on it, every footfall was stabbing agony. He gulped and concentrated on staying upright. 

They came to a shallow creek that Cora grumbled about but with Stiles’s leg couldn’t be avoided. They waded through. It was cold, but no deeper than their ankles. 

“Jesus,” John muttered. He shook his foot, but the leathery green lump wouldn’t detach from his boot. “Leeches. Perfect.” 

Stiles flicked his fingers at it. 

The body rippled with pain as embers lit up along it, smoke coiling up; it popped off with a sizzle. 

Stiles let his hand drop; sweat rolled down his neck.

“Thank you.” John’s voice was distant and fuzzy. 

One more step, Stiles bargained. _Just one more. Another. You can make it one more. Again. Another._ It wasn’t long before he was calling himself a liar. His leg was throbbing with sharp spikes of pain again, but there was nothing to do but take another step. One more. He flicked his fingers, but the relief was minor.

Cora sniffed noisily. “I smell magic.”

“That’s probably me,” Stiles mumbled. He felt John look at him and gestured. He’d put a shield around his leg in a lame attempt to cushion every step. It was taking most of his concentration to keep the shield on just one limb rather than his whole body. 

“No, it isn’t that. It’s faint and it’s…different.” She struggled for a minute. “It smells like a storm and a flood and an earthquake, all at once.”

Stiles managed to frown at her. “What does my magic smell like?”

“Lightning. Wildfire.”

“Oh.”

“What does an earthquake smell like?” John wondered. 

“Like the earth splitting open. Fresh dirt, a wound. I dunno.” 

“Huh.”

Stiles stopped listening. He had to focus on keeping his leg shielded and staying up, and making conversation was one task too many.

“Cave,” Cora chirped. “Come on.”

They helped Stiles sit down carefully, left leg stretched out as gently as they could manage. The splint felt tighter than it had earlier, meaning it’d started swelling. 

“We’re gonna get stuff to make a fire, okay?”

Stiles nodded blindly, taking his backpack off. He gritted his teeth, squeezing down noises of pain, and lifted his leg. He put his hand down and made an ice slab, just long enough to go under his thigh. Then he layered his spare blanket and clothes on it before setting his leg down. He collapsed against the warm, damp cave wall, breathing hard. He looked over, but Cora and John were outside gathering firewood.

Distracted. 

He bowed forward over his leg. Panic squeezed his lungs. Tears rushed down his cheeks as he shuddered, sucking in air to try to muffle his sobs. If his leg wasn’t set right, he could have trouble moving _forever_ , if he didn’t sever nerves and tendons and whatever else with the broken edges of the bone first. He would risk John’s _life_ if he couldn’t move. He put his hands on his head, clutching at his hair, as more panicked tears poured from him. He’d slow John down, trip him up. Slow everyone down. 

He’d die.

The sobs stopped as abruptly as they started. He remembered every creature he’d had to run from, every time his ability to flee from danger had saved his life or the life of someone he cared about. He choked on another sob, covering his mouth.

“-just saying, if you like _those_ movies, I don’t see how you hadn’t seen…” Cora’s voice grew louder as she and John returned. 

Stiles wiped his face on his shirt and tried to pull himself together. He wasn’t dead yet and he could still use magic. It would be harder, but he wasn’t powerless. His chest trembled with another sob that he bit back. 

Cora and John tried to build the fire without his help and Cora roped Stiles in on how terrible John’s taste in movies was. 

Stiles cast his senses tentatively, afraid of what he’d find, and felt their comradery, their concern for him. The connections were as strong as ever, even Cora’s mystery connection. He made himself calm down. He would just have to be sure not to burden them, to protect them. They’d have to make it to the settlement; if there were witches there, surely _some_ of them knew medicinal magic and could help him. Or maybe they’d have a really good doctor.

Rosalva was a vampire, but she’d managed to fix most injuries, with or without Asher’s magical balms and potions. 

Stiles flicked his fingers; he was injured, not useless. Perimeter spells. Camouflage. Shields. The works for a night of little sleep, if he was guessing right. 

“How come you can’t heal yourself?” Cora asked while they were eating the last of the deer she’d caught. Hers was cooked rare and she looked deeply annoyed about it.

“That’s a different kind of magic than I do.” He swallowed and looked at his bag. “Witches have different strengths and that’s…not one of mine.” 

“Oh. Huh.”

Outside, Stiles saw the grass frost over, the air turning misty as the warm ground cooled quickly. He stared for a second, then looked away, grabbing his bag and pulling out the Book of Shadows. He passed his thumb over the edges of the pages. He flipped through slowly, hoping to find healing magic. 

Elle didn’t seem very good at gentle magic. She did have a spell for filling someone’s lungs with water, crushing their hearts, and for crushing one specific bone at a time. 

He didn’t know what she did in life, but her battle magic was hardcore, things he never would’ve used or even considered using before. She was a survivor, though, a fighter, he could tell, and now she was going to help _him_ survive. 

“Stiles, put that away. You should sleep.”

Stiles looked up; Cora was stretched out on her side, watching the mist swirl outside. “I can’t sleep.” 

“You haven’t tried, you should-”

“Dad, I can’t. I’ll just keep watch. You guys get some sleep, so you can help me walk tomorrow.” The pain in his leg would definitely keep him from sleeping. 

Cora shot Stiles a sympathetic smile, turned her head, and closed her eyes. 

John frowned worriedly. “There might be something in the potions Asher gave us-”

“No, we should save what we can for tomorrow.” Stiles smiled. “Try to sleep.”

John eventually curled up under his blanket, but Stiles could tell he wasn’t sleeping for at least an hour after he laid down.

Stiles tried to concentrate on the book, but his leg was throbbing, drawing his attention away again and again. Once again, he missed the internet, his phone, video games—anything that would give him a mindless distraction from his current situation, which was looking worse the longer he thought about it.

He closed the book and set it aside. He looked out of the cave, past the fire, squinting for any sign of snow. The mist swirled, turning everything gray. 

A shape moved through the mist, pacing just outside the cave entrance. 

Stiles glanced down at his leg, but he couldn’t imagine getting up on his own. He gathered light in his palm and hurled it out.

It bounced and exploded, leaving the mist unchanged and the shadow still a mystery. It looked vaguely feline. 

He looked at his hand and bit his lip, then held it out. A stream of orange flames shot out, cutting through the mist like a hot knife through butter. 

The shadow turned out to be a big, sleek black feline. It was enormous, without the leopard’s all-over eyes or the jaguar’s gills. It paced back and forth, glancing at the cave on every lap as if it could tell they were there despite Stiles’s spells that should’ve kept them from being detected by most animals.

It might’ve been a panther…was there a difference? He couldn’t remember. He bit his lip, because it _shouldn’t_ have known they were there. On the other hand, it seemed to anyway and that could mean they were in danger. He twisted his fingers. 

Roots pushed up, creeping toward the panther along the ground like snakes. They wrapped around its back legs and tugged, prodded its flank, tickled its face. Stiles tried to annoy it, entice it, and physically drag it away, but it wasn’t to be deterred. 

Finally, it sat outside of the cave, just past the shields, and stared in. Its eyes were an intense, brilliant orange. 

They watched each other all night; Stiles was almost hypnotized by its gaze, to the point of forgetting even the pain in his leg. He just watched, mind echoingly silent for maybe the first time in his life. 

By morning, the panther began pacing, releasing Stiles from its hypnotic gaze. 

He felt weirdly rested, although he was sure he hadn’t slept at all. His leg, however, was still in pain, and the painkillers had long since worn off. He winced, dropping his gaze to the splint. The swelling had gone down a bit thanks to the ice he’d put under it, but that just left it agonizing and trapped in a rough splint. 

Cora woke up before John, stretching and then sitting up with a big, fang-baring yawn. The moment she noticed the panther, she went tense all over, snapping up on all fours. She even seemed to swell like a dog with its hackles raised. 

“Leave it,” Stiles ordered. “It hasn’t tried to come in, it just stared all night.”

Cora turned to frown at him. “Why didn’t you wake one of us up so you could sleep?”

“I didn’t even realize how much time had passed,” he admitted. “Not safe.”

She shrugged. “You were awake, you’ve got magic.”

He laughed. “You have way more faith in me than you should.”

“I’ve never met a witch before and you haven’t failed yet. You killed all those elves yesterday.” She wiped her face and stretched. 

Stiles was weirdly touched. “There are plenty better than me,” he said with a sigh.

“Hmm.” She looked doubtful. “Are you sure we can’t fight it?”

“Leave it. You’re gonna get hurt.” He searched his bag. “Let’s eat, then we can wake Dad.”

“Okay.” She scowled at him when he cooked her portion, but she still ate it with just her razor sharp fangs, so she was fine, even if she was still irritated about it. 

Stiles cast his senses while he ate, prodding at the panther. He didn’t sense any aggression, just a weird tranquility that he’d never felt before. 

The panther’s tail swished as it paced, curling and straightening over and over.

John woke to the smell of meat cooking, grumbling and turning over. He stretched and yawned, rolling his head to glare at the sunlight streaming into their cave. He scrambled upright with a gasp, fumbling for his gun.

“It’s been there all night,” Stiles hurried to say. “Hasn’t tried anything and won’t leave.” 

“You tried magic?”

“Yep.”

“He won’t let me fight it off.” Cora finished her food and licked blood from her lips.

“It’s a lot bigger than you.” John studied it for a long moment before shaking his head and moving closer to Stiles and Cora. 

Stiles gave him his food and the last of the snap peas Asher had given them. He watched the panther while John ate, trying to understand what it wanted—aside from an easy meal. Not all of the mutated creatures they’d come across were dangerous. Some were just…odd. Maybe the panther lived in this cave and couldn’t get in. Did panthers live in caves? Maybe they were keeping it from going to sleep.

John and Cora packed up with little help from Stiles; the best he could do was extinguish the fire and fold his own stuff into his bag. 

Stiles made a marker near the cave entrance, then leaned back on his palms, flexing his foot in his boot. The movement made the pain worse, shifted the fractured bone and had him grinding his teeth. 

“Ready?” Cora lifted him to his feet without waiting for an answer, then peered into his face seriously. “Do you have to pee? Tell me before we start walking.”

He flushed red. Good _god_ , he needed help with everything. “Let’s deal with the panther,” he said instead of answering. 

John handed him his backpack to put on. 

“Okay. I’m going to drop the camouflage and everything, so just…stay close so I can shield us if it attacks.”

“Okay.”

“ _Fine._ ”

Stiles lifted a hand and tentatively crumpled their protections, casting them away. He caught his breath. 

The panther paused, looking over at them. Its head dipped and it turned away. 

Cora tipped her head. “I don’t get it. Why’d it sit here all night just to walk away?”

The panther sat beneath a tree away from the cave, staring at them with its tail ticking impatiently. 

“It wants us to follow,” John announced. 

“Really?”

“No,” Stiles snapped. “And if it does, it’s so it can _eat us_ at its _leisure._ It’s a wild panther, not Lassie.”

“Stiles-”

“No, what if it’s leading us to a trap?”

“Stiles-”

“You are insane. No.” 

He looked Stiles in the eye, mouth drawn, eyes tired and dull. “You don’t have too many options here, son. If there’s a chance it could help, shouldn’t we take it?”

“Dad,” Stiles said, feeling like maybe he was dreaming, “it is a _panther._ ” He looked at Cora for help, but she was baring her teeth and posturing at the panther, oblivious to their argument. 

“Have you sensed anything violent from it? Dangerous?” John pressed. 

Stiles shook his head. “That doesn’t always mean-” 

“Let’s follow it,” Cora declared. “If it starts going in the wrong direction, we’ll just stop and go our own way.” 

Stiles felt like screaming. “But what if it eats us?” He felt this was a fair question, since his two companions seemed to think following a wild panther was completely logical. 

She shrugged. “Something will eventually.”

Stiles and John stared at her.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll put up a good fight first,” she tempered apologetically. 

Stiles pinched the bridge of his nose. “We need to leave a safe distance between us and the cat, got it? I need space to put up a shield if it attacks.”

“Great. Let’s go.” John started to put Stiles’s arm over his shoulder, but Cora waved him off.

“I’ve got him.” She matched her steps with Stiles’s awkward gait, and they began following the panther. 

It licked its lips and flicked its ears before setting off at a languid walk, picking a path through the roots that Stiles could barely navigate. 

He tinkered with a shield until he created a sort of magical boot, more cushion than the day before. It still hurt with every step. “Hey,” he snapped at John when he got a little too far ahead. “Stay in shielding range.” Even he could hear the irritability in his own voice, knew it was the pain making him snappish, but he couldn’t help it. John needed to stay close anyway. 

Cora’s gaze was fixed on the panther as they walked.

John watched Stiles. “You okay there?” he asked mildly instead of acknowledging Stiles’s tone.

Stiles nodded, staring ahead. He just needed them to stay together and keep a safe distance from the two hundred and fifty pound carnivore ahead of them. The next step was agony, and the one after that was worse. Sweat beaded on his face, down his neck. The pain was no longer just sharp but burning, despite the splint and shield. Like something with razor teeth was tearing its way through his leg, chewing its way out, and it was getting harder and harder to convince his body that they needed to keep walking.

“Stiles?” John prompted. 

“Fine,” he snapped. “I’m fine. Just keep going.” He felt Cora look up at him but couldn’t summon the energy to look down. He just hoped they were going where they needed to go. He wouldn’t make it if they had to backtrack. He reached out with his fear, seeking comfort, and felt it from John, from Cora. He felt Lydia and Boyd’s determination bolster him, Laura’s optimism spiking his energy. Even Derek and Peter, given to sulky moods, felt driven by something, and it helped chase Stiles’s dread away. 

He managed to lift his head. 

The panther glanced back. Its brilliant orange gaze captured his and held. 

He saw the path it was taking as clearly as a marked road. Relief had him slumping, left him nearly boneless. 

“I smell magic,” Cora said with a frown. “Like yesterday, not yours.” 

“It’s—we’re—it’s taking us in the right direction.” Stiles shared a relieved grin with John, even if Cora was confused. 

“Yeah, well, there’s the river again.” 

The panther led them right up to the river and waited, gaze locked on Stiles again.

He lifted a hand and hesitated, gaze darting to Cora’s bare feet. He noticed the roots the panther was sitting on. _Duh._ What an idiot he’d been. He swallowed and clenched his right hand, then stretched his fingers out. 

Roots burst from the ground and lashed across the fast moving river, digging into the dirt on the opposite bank. More whipped across, burrowing deep into the ground to stabilize the bridge. 

The panther was the first to step on it, showing no hesitation or fear. 

John watched it go, then glanced at Stiles before following it.

“This is much better than the ice one,” Cora chirped as they crossed. She leaned away to look into the water briefly. 

Stiles’s boot caught in the roots as they were stepping off the bridge, throwing him forward hard enough to rip him out of Cora’s hold. He landed on his left side, screaming before he could stop it as his leg jostled. He curled toward it automatically, shuddering and pulling in hitching breaths. He clenched his fists and swore viciously against the ground until the worst of the pain had ebbed, leaving him drained. 

“I’m sorry!” Cora gasped, squirming under his arm. “You just-” 

“I know, it’s—it’s not your fault.” He had to swallow back nausea as his stomach pitched. He couldn’t afford to waste food by puking.

John crouched in front of them. “Do you need us to take a break?”

Stiles shook his head. “Break or not, I’m not—my leg isn’t gonna be any better in an hour or two. We should keep going.” His jaw ached from clenching. “Let’s just—just go.” He got up with Cora’s help, drank some water at John’s insistence, and they set off again.

The panther led them patiently. 

Stiles mostly kept his gaze on the ground as they walked, making sure he didn’t fall again, so it took him a while to notice the light was changing, getting brighter. He looked up and noticed the haze of heavy magic ahead of them; the trees were thinning, with more space between them, letting more afternoon light in. 

The panther led them to a pair of black trees curved together at the top like an arch and sat, curling its tail around its massive paws. 

Stiles flung his senses out and sagged. “We’re almost there.” The trees were markers, too, humming with magic like a doorway. 

The panther disappeared, there one second and gone the next. 

John stared at where it’d been. “Alright…”

Stiles shook his head. “No idea.”

“All I can smell is magic,” Cora huffed. “’Cept yours, I can’t smell yours.”

 _Lightning. Wildfire._ Stiles frowned, then shook his head. “Come on. Through the trees.” One problem at a time. He had more than enough to concentrate on, like trying to walk. 

They walked between the arched trees together, with John on Stiles’s injured side. They stepped out of the hazy jungle gloom and into an open field. The grass was soft butter yellow and ankle high, waving in a gentle breeze. The air smelled less _green_ here, lighter, easier to breathe. Less humid, too. 

“Almost there,” John said quietly. 

Stiles nodded, bracing himself for more walking. “Let’s go.”


	8. Chapter 8

Cora was mostly carrying Stiles as they closed in on the place where the intense protective magic was coming from. John was on his left, helping him stay up, but he could barely lift his head. His broken leg felt hot and swollen again, pain gnawing at it from the inside and leaving him useless. He shuddered when they started down a hill, his leg jostling with every step.

A sharp pang of danger zipped through him. His head snapped up. Something was flying at John. “ _No!_ ” Fire burst out of him. The yellow grass scorched black around them. The arrow disintegrated. Up ahead, a shield rippled briefly, reacting to his attack. An old, metal sign shimmered into view. 

**QUEENSHAVEN**

“Hold him,” Cora ordered, shoving Stiles at John. “I’ll fight.”

Stiles teetered dangerously before John caught his upper arm.

He already had his gun out. “No, you’re the only one who can move fast with him. You hold him, and I’ll-”

Cora snarled. 

A group ran toward them, passing the sign together. 

John stepped forward, leaving Stiles wobbling.

Cora grabbed him, physically vibrating.

“We don’t want trouble,” John called. “We’re looking for the Queen of the South.”

A woman with short gray hair snorted, covering her mouth and flicking her gaze at the woman up front. The third, a younger woman with flying gold hair, laughed. 

The woman leading the charge had short, chestnut hair and weathered tawny skin, wearing a gray shirt and what _looked_ like blue jeans, tucked into supple leather boots. She rubbed her eyes and muttered a curse under her breath. “My name is Cheska,” she grumbled. She cleared her throat. “I am Cheska Moore. Queen of the South is just a stupid nickname people started because of the town sign.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Who are you?”

“We’ve been looking for you,” Stiles said stupidly. “We need help.” Less stupid. Factual. He stretched his magic out to meet hers, felt the spark of acknowledgement from hers and sighed, relieved. Powerful witch. 

She nodded. “You need medical attention. Come on. Tanvi, Andee, you can go back to your posts. Can you walk?”

Cora tightened her grip on Stiles. “Yes.” She angled her chin up.

The blonde woman saluted, making the one with gray hair roll her eyes. 

“This way.” Cheska gestured at them to follow her. If Stiles had to guess, he’d place her in her late forties, early fifties, taller than Cora but shorter than John. She carried herself tall and straight. 

“Why’d you shoot at us?” Stiles asked, neck prickling.

“We’ve been getting attacked by elves every few days. We thought you were them, but we didn't mean to hurt anyone.”

John perked up. “Elves broke his leg, a group of about ten. They jumped us back there…” He went on to explain the fight. 

Stiles let his head droop as they passed through the curtain of protections and into Queenshaven. 

They followed Cheska down a dirt path lined with medium sized stones. She was talking to John, explaining the name, how they got there, and where she was taking them, but Stiles couldn’t understand her. 

His leg was agony. He felt faint as his energy flagged. His eyes fluttered. He slumped, his knee collapsing and taking the rest of him down before Cora could catch him. Sharp pain pierced his thigh as it folded unnaturally, ripping a howl of pain from his chest. 

He didn’t know if he blacked out or they teleported, but when he opened his eyes, smoke hovered over him and he could smell herbs burning. He was on his back, flat out and aching, while shadows moved around him. He tried to turn his head, groaning.

A woman caught his face from above, holding him steady. Her gold-brown eyes were concerned before she pressed a palm over his eyes. “Trust me, you don’t want to be awake for this part,” she said, and her psychic spell dragged him back to unconsciousness. 

The next time he woke, Stiles felt…better. The pain in his leg was different, less sharp, not hot and stiff, and it was being held in place by something sturdier than the splint John and Cora had made. He sat up cautiously. He was alone in a cool, dark room, in a _bed._ He touched his leg, found metal slats, padding, and stiff fabric bracing his leg in place. He felt at it with his magic next and discovered healing magic woven into it, protections, and a dull kind of spell he realized after a second was meant to blunt the pain. 

He stretched his right leg and tried to get up, but hit the wall. He scowled and curled his fingers together, shining a light, turning to examine his surroundings. 

The walls were dark wood on all sides with a break for a door and behind his bed, centered, what looked like a window with curtains drawn over it. 

“What the hell…” He looked at the floor and found stone, smooth and gray, and his backpack and boots set neatly beside the bed he was on. He reached out for John and Cora, afraid. 

They were both sleeping on the other side of the door, content, safe. 

Stiles cautiously got out of bed, swinging his injured leg down first by necessity. He braced for more pain but it didn’t change from a dull ache. The spell was doing its job. He limped to the window first, twitching at the curtain. 

The sky was the pink-gray of dawn, which meant Stiles had slept…a lot. He grimaced and hobbled to the door barefoot, swinging it open. 

John and Cora were slumped together on a mattress to the right of the door, snoring peacefully. 

Cora was wearing clean clothes, a green shirt and pants that Stiles had never seen before, still barefoot. She snuffled against John’s shoulder and turned her head, then opened her eyes with a jolt. She stared at Stiles blankly before a grin cracked her face and she twisted, shoving at John excitedly, body bumping him like she’d forgotten she had hands. “He’s awake!” 

“Shhhh,” John grumbled, prying his eyes open one at a time. He had to blink a few times to focus on Stiles before he smiled, too. 

“What _happened_ yesterday?”

“They had to reset your leg, you fell and the bone moved weird,” Cora gushed. “You _screamed_ even though they tried to keep you asleep so you wouldn’t feel it.”

“Oh.” He looked at the brace gratefully. He didn’t remember. 

“Yeah, it was _awful_ , they made us wait out here.” Cora frowned. “Are you still in a lot of pain?”

“No, it’s getting better. Or it’s numb right now, at least.” He scratched his nose and ran a hand through his hair, throwing the scent of the burning herb in the air. Probably some mixture of lavender and passion flower, boosted with magic, to keep him sleeping while they’d set his leg. 

“They gave us food and some clothes and John talked to Cheska a little bit but we didn’t want to leave you so we mostly stayed right here.” 

Stiles managed a smile for her. “Thanks.”

She beamed back.

He felt at the walls and floor, the ceiling, trying to get a picture of where they really were—an abandoned hotel? Everything felt sturdy, newish, and both magical and mundane, hand built and magically fortified. 

They were in an actual building, with rooms, windows, doors, a _hallway_ , that had been built _after_ the bombs. Some of the components like the door across the hallway were taken from old buildings, scavenged from ruins, but others were new. 

Stiles could only stare for a long time, wrapping his brain around it. New buildings meant permanence, meant staying in one place long enough to build and make use of the building. These people had made a place to stay, maybe—possibly—just a place to treat their wounded. He turned, examining the door he’d come through. Hinges, a doorknob and lock, solid wood. 

“Stiles, maybe you should be resting.” John looked tense, face drawn in unhappy lines. 

“Probably, but we need to speak to the Queen—er, Cheska.” 

He sighed. “They told us to come get food when you woke up. Might as well go now.” He stood and stretched, knees and back popping audibly. 

Cora jumped to her feet, stretching her arms above her head. “Can you walk?”

“Uh-huh.” He followed them, since they seemed to know where to go. Left down the hall from his room, past several other doors, windows, and light fixtures. The fixtures were crude and couldn’t possibly be functional, unless they were for candles, Stiles thought, but maybe they were preparing for when they had electricity. The building was pleasantly cool, possibly from the stone floors. Stiles wished he’d have gone back for his boots, but he was too busy being dazzled to really care. His leg ached as they walked, but he didn’t say anything. After yesterday’s pain, this was nothing. It was a relief to see the walls, the doors, like he suddenly felt safe. He had to remind himself to stay on guard, but he couldn’t help it—they’d made it to their destination and that _was_ something to be happy about, whatever happened next. 

Cora glanced back at Stiles with a mischievous smile, eyes gleaming, as they reached the end of the hallway. 

The walls opened up into a large room with mostly windows for walls; there were wooden tables and chairs set around the place like a restaurant. Some of the chairs had colorful woven cushions on them, some were dark wood, others light. There were light fixtures hanging from the ceiling, too, but all the light was coming from the windows. 

A man with short brown hair, wearing shorts and a blue shirt, stood in front of what _looked_ like an electric stove, next to a brick oven that looked handmade. Both were set between long wood-and-stone counters; there was an island behind him made of the same materials, laden with plates, bowls, cups, and forks and knives. Dishes. 

Stiles felt his magic reach out and flinched, then reached back, a magical handshake. 

The man turned and smiled, gaze drifting over all of them. “Oh, you’re awake. Thea _did_ say you’d wake up after dawn. Hungry?”

“Yes,” Cora said, clutching her stomach. 

“Great. We’ve got omelets, fruit cups, fresh water, and guava juice today, Greta was getting fancy.”

Stiles just stared at him. “How-?”

“Well, it’s just what we’ve got from the farms today, it’s always changing.”

“F-farms?” he sputtered. “Plural?”

His face cleared. “Yes. Here, let’s get you guys sitting with some food. I’m Ulric,” he added with a quick grin. He ushered them to a table and brought them plates despite John protesting he could get it. “No trouble, you must be exhausted.”

Stiles frowned at him when he set a plate in front of him. “Your accent…your voice…”

“Familiar? I helped Thea set your leg last night and helped make your brace. You must’ve heard me talking.”

“Probably.” Stiles touched the brace thoughtfully. “The cloth?” he guessed, feeling at the magic. 

Ulric grinned. “Yep. I’m skilled with textile magic. Made her shirt and pants last night.” He gestured at Cora.

She already had a mouthful of egg, so she just nodded and grunted. 

“Well…thanks.”

“No problem. Enjoy your breakfast.” He darted back to the stove, and it wasn’t long before a couple others joined him, fluttering around what Stiles was realizing was a cafeteria and preparing food. 

He ate slowly, watching them work, watching John and Cora eat. They looked relaxed, but they’d probably briefly met Ulric the previous night. The food—the _omelet_ was good, sprinkled with pepper and stuffed with vegetables. Stiles was having an out of body experience. It was like the market at Mad Hollow all over again, like they’d stepped back in time, before the bombs, back to normalcy. It felt wrong. Stiles stuck an orange slice in his mouth to distract himself. 

Ulric passed by with a plate to set on a table by a window; on his way back to the kitchen, Stiles stood. He lifted his brows. 

“I—we need to speak to Cheska.”

“Oh!” He relaxed and smiled. “She’s already on her way, Oona went to get her.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

“Sure. You should finish eating, you look like you need it.”

Stiles sat back down reluctantly, but he couldn’t refute it; his leg was getting more painful the longer they sat there, and just standing to get Ulric’s attention had cost him. He tried not to notice John watching him. 

It was hard. John was obviously worried, and who could blame him? But Stiles didn’t have a clue about how to comfort him except what he was already doing: grit his teeth and pretend he was fine. 

By the time they’d finished eating, the pain was sharp and jagged again, pulsing out from the middle of his thigh. He clenched his hands into fists and didn’t argue when Cora gathered their dishes up for them. 

“Oh, good, you _are_ up. Oona seemed sure, but she doesn’t have much practice with witches she doesn’t know.” Cheska strode to their table, then frowned down at Stiles. Her gaze softened, then flicked to John. “Why don’t we go back to your room so you can elevate that leg and we can talk?”

“That sounds good,” Stiles sighed. He let Cheska help him up, cutting a quick warning glance at Cora so she wouldn’t intervene. 

“Great. I know we have plenty to talk about.” 

Stiles hoped that meant she was ready for Della.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a little... **mini spoiler**? I guess? Because I believe (want to believe?) that the majority of people will help each other during a crisis rather than whatever else apocalypse shows/movies/books show...we will Not be going all Walking Dead here. Just. To put that out there. <3 If that helps anyone relax, yay! if it ruined the suspense, sorry? D:


	9. Chapter 9

Cheska was vaguely familiar to Stiles. Not as though he’d known her, really, but…something about her bearing, the way her magic felt, was familiar to him. It made no sense, so he didn’t mention it, just tucked the feeling away in the back of his mind to examine later, when he had time to think. 

She led them back to Stiles’s room without hesitation, finding her way effortlessly. 

Stiles sat on the bed, trying to disguise his pained panting as a yawn; Cora sat on his right, squirming up until she could lean back against the wall, legs sticking out straight over the edge. 

Cheska stood in the center of the room after twitching the curtains open, letting in light. 

John planted his feet and stayed near the door, arms crossed, not quite blocking it. He met Stiles’s gaze and nodded once. 

Stiles swallowed. “We came here to warn you that a witch named Della Summers is going to try to destroy your settlement and kill you,” he blurted. 

“ _Smoooooth,_ ” Cora crooned.

He elbowed her. 

Cheska shook her head. “I know her. She’s been trying to kill me or stop me for years. You’ll be safe here,” she added gently. 

He tried not to glare or scowl; Cheska knew Della. That was a start. “Well, she’s destroyed other settlements, groups, witches. She’s doing some psychic magic to siphon their power when she kills them.”

Cheska’s face tightened. “She always did like experiments,” she growled. 

“She’s also got elves following her, and maybe faeries. She sent the elves that have been attacking you. Nature spirits are helping her willingly.”

She looked briefly worried. “Willingly?” Then she shook it off. “We are well protected here and strong, ready for her.” 

“And her army?” John pressed. 

“If she manages to gather one, we’ll fight her.” She lifted her chin.

“Why is she afraid of you?”

Her gaze snapped back to Stiles. “What?” 

“She’s been afraid to confront you directly. Why?”

She sighed. “Because I brought her into the collective’s custody for using experimental magic on an adolescent human.”

Stiles glanced at John, then Cora, and back to Cheska. “You were going to be the one stripping her magic?”

“Yes.” She folded her hands in front of her. “She would’ve been weakened, but much less harm to the people around her. It was my job.”

Stiles nodded; he supposed that was why she seemed familiar. An officer of the collective would be recognizable to most witches due to their unique magic skills. “She’s dangerous,” he said at last. He didn't know how else to convince her of the threat. “You might’ve imprisoned her once, but she’s stronger now.”

“We all are,” Cheska said calmly. 

John caught Stiles’s eye and shook his head. 

Stiles sighed. “We have people coming.”

Cheska looked surprised. “Well, as long as everyone helps and isn’t here to cause harm, then everyone is welcome.”

Stiles’s jaw clenched. He didn’t appreciate being spoken to like a panicking child, running scared every time a breeze knocked a tree against the window. “They are coming to help fight Della, because you are going to need it.” He spoke as clearly, calmly, and firmly as he could. 

Cheska smiled vaguely at him.

He glowered, then straightened as a thought occurred to him. Cheska had worked for the collective. “Asher Clarke is bringing them.” 

She lurched forward, grabbing his arm tightly enough to bruise. With a gasp, she let go as he shocked her instinctively, shaking her hand. “Asher survived?” she barked. 

“Yes.”

She eased back, pressing her palms together. “Sorry.” She swallowed. “I’m glad he made it. His mother Wish and I were close.” She frowned at the floor, her eyes going distant. 

“Cheska,” Stiles said, “you—we all need to take Della’s threat seriously. She has very thorough plans for how she’s going to take over, and her biggest obstacle is you.”

“Of course.” She pushed at her short hair, still frowning. “We’ll add more protections at the perimeters. You need more rest,” she added. “And you should take it easy on that leg.”

“Yeah, I plan on it.”

“We’ll bring in cots for your father and friend, that way you can all be together while you heal.” She glanced at Cora, then John. “Unless you guys would like a tour while Stiles rests?”

It gave him a jolt when she said his name, but the other two didn’t seem surprised; they must’ve told her yesterday while he was unconscious. 

Cora leaned on Stiles’s shoulder. “No, I’m good here.” She rested her chin on his shoulder, staring balefully at Cheska as if to dare her to suggest separating them again. It reminded Stiles of Peter, his unflagging loyalty. All three of the Hales had had it, in their own ways. 

Cheska’s mouth twitched. “And you?”

“I’ll stay.” John sighed, looking over at the two of them exasperatedly. “But we’ll take those cots.”

Cheska smiled. “Of course.”

After two cots were brought in, Cheska told them she had some work to do, but that there were people around if they needed help. Cora stayed on Stiles’s bed even after Cheska left, bouncing in place. She couldn’t have known that every move was sending pain flaming up and down his leg, so he tried his best not to shove her over the edge. 

“We saw buildings when they were bringing you here, and _people_ , and cows. They call it Queenshaven and it’s like a real-life town, like you used to see on TV.” Cora sighed, draping herself over the end of the bed. “There’s toilets and running water, with no _piranhas._ ”

“That’s awesome.” How? It had to be witches, kinetics, but the structures, how had they managed this?

“There’s magic _everywhere_ , everything smells like all kinds of magic.” She put her palms against the wall. “I like it,” she said simply. “It feels safe here.” She grinned. “Plus, there’s food and they fixed your leg.”

“Yeah, there’s that.”

She rolled off the bed. “Be right back, I have to pee.”

John, from his cot, snorted, but didn’t look up from the book he was reading.

Stiles frowned when he realized it was Elle’s Book of Shadows. John had never shown an interest in reading spellbooks before…or was it that Stiles and Claudia had never offered, assuming he’d have no interest since he couldn’t perform the spells? Or maybe he was bored and it was the only thing he could find to do without leaving the room. “Dad?”

“Hmm?”

“Why are you reading that?” he asked tentatively. He didn’t want to make it sound like he wanted him to stop, but he was too curious not to ask.

John shrugged. “Just curious. How do you _learn_ these things? It’s not exactly a textbook.”

Stiles laughed, relaxing. “No, it isn’t. Just practice, I guess.”

“Ah.”

He moved forward. “You try it exactly how the book says until you feel a click,” he explained, feeling…eager. John had never really shown interest in this part of Stiles’s magic, the learning, and now it seemed he wanted to know. “Once you feel that click, the spell becomes part of you, and your magic adapts it. You’ll be able to do it without all the steps.”

“Really? But how do you do it without the steps? Or why do you need the steps in the first place?” 

“Well, you have to learn the spell, how it feels when it’s done right, and your magic…it’s like a muscle, so you have to train it, but once you’ve trained it…muscle memory.”

“Hmm. Thank you.”

“Sure.” Stiles watched him read for a while, puzzling through his sudden interest. Maybe being outnumbered by magic users had done it? That would make anyone wonder, he supposed. 

Cora returned and tossed an apple on the bed. “For you. I heard Ulric in the kitchen and he thinks you’ll be walking in a couple days, brace off in five or six.”

“ _Days?_ ” John blurted, looking up. 

Cora passed him a bunch of grapes. “Uh-huh. Healing magic, it takes _forever._ ” 

John boggled. 

Stiles laughed and bit into his apple. The crunch, the sticky sweet juice, the flavor, plucked memories forward, begrudgingly snacking on apples instead of Doritos until he was old enough to buy his own junk food, throwing apple cores at Scott and Boyd, apple pie with Erica and Lydia. He ate quickly.

“I missed grapes,” Cora sighed, flopping across her cot. “Ulric said someone could help me with my hair. Can’t we just cut it off?” Her brown hair was tangled and filthy from who knew how long without brushing or washing it; she’d mostly been living as a wolf, but still, somehow she’d developed a bird’s nest on her head. 

“You’ll have to try to tame it a bit for scissors to work,” John told her, amused. 

Cora bared her teeth lazily. “Nothing about me is tame.”

“You’re a regular wild thing,” Stiles drawled. 

She threw a grape at his head hard enough to bruise; he grabbed it from the bed and ate it. “ _Ugh_ , whatever. Maybe they’ll get the tangles out and I’ll get a makeover.” She fluttered her lashes. 

“Yes. America’s Next Top Model-style, except there’s no TV, no America, and no models.”

“That just leaves Next Top.” She didn’t laugh when Stiles did, lifting her brows with confusion.

John shook his head. “Just cut it off and start fresh.”

“That’s my plan.” She kicked her legs out to reach John’s bed. “It’s-” She cocked her head. 

A witch with powerful magic came marching down the hall, then into the room. “Usually I knock, except when my patients with broken _femurs_ go traipsing about!” She was a little taller than Cora, with warm brown skin and neat curls, but the most striking thing about her was the powerful magic oozing from her. It was medicinal and garden magic, but it was formidable. 

Stiles could tell Cheska was powerful, too, but not like this. This witch was not to be challenged. “Um,” he managed. 

She shot him a look. “You have a transverse fracture in your femur, which you walked on, untreated, for a day and a half, damaging the soft tissue of your leg, which I have been tasked with fixing. You need to stay in bed, keep that leg elevated, and rest.”

“Okay,” he managed. He reached his magic out tentatively, like an unsure child trying out handshakes for the first time.

She tapped him back and smiled sweetly, losing her intensity. “Good. I’m Thea, the doctor here. I’ve got helpers, but I’m the only one with pre-bomb medical training.” She waited until he nodded. “So when I tell you to stay in bed, I mean it.” She flashed her sweet smile again, cheeks dimpling, and went to a stool set beside his bed. A flicker of flame, then smoke lazily drifted through the room. “I’ll just reapply that numbing spell now.”

“Thank you…” Stiles’s nose twitched when he smelled the burning herbs. 

“Oh, don’t mention it.” She pressed her hands over the brace, waves of pastel purple magic flickering under her palms. 

The pain faded with each flicker. “Thank you,” he sighed. 

She smiled again. “Ulric will bring you lunch when you wake up.”

His eyes were already flagging, but he gathered his energy to ask, “What?” The smoke tickled his nose again.

“You need rest. So rest. Oh, don’t worry, you two won’t feel it,” Thea said, voice going muffled. “Nifty little herb bundle with his hair, I’ll show you. Oh, Cora, could you help me tuck him in?”

Stiles’s eyes closed as they adjusted his limp form so that his head was on the pillow, blanket draping over his torso. He was definitely going to have a talk with all of them about magically drugging people, but…but he supposed if he were in a hospital, wandering around with a broken leg, they’d do something similar…Still…this was rude. Although the relief of his pain…

He drifted from exhausted mental rambling into dreams without noticing. He dreamed of Derek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm probably going to stick with this once a week schedule, that way I have time to write the next one because I've decided to participate in a thing and I like to have lots of time to complete stuff!


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3 <3 <3

Laura scrubbed at her arms, her neck, with a bunched up old shirt, face tilted toward the sky. The rain was cool and refreshing, so she hadn’t been able to resist stopping to clean days’ worth of mud and dirt off. While she scrubbed, Peter and Derek romped around in mud puddles like overgrown puppies, but she couldn’t tell them to stop. They’d found a mostly intact little house on an untamed backroad mostly occupied by melted mailboxes, craters, and a few cars. The shutters were hot pink. The house itself seemed to have belonged to a long-gone witch, magic stinging the air, so it’d survived what had destroyed its neighbors. There’d been some spiders in the kitchen when they’d arrived, and a raccoon that took off when it saw Peter, but otherwise, it seemed like a good place to sleep out the rain.

“Guys, clean the mud off before you come in.” She scrubbed the shirt over her face, then spread it out flat on the cracked pavement she was standing on. Maybe the rain would wash it. She looked at their empty soap bottle sadly before tossing it aside. It bounced in the grass. She thought of John and grimaced, hunching her shoulders guiltily and picking it up. She took it to the half-melted black trash can at the end of the driveway, then headed back to the house, embarrassed that she’d let a human guilt her from afar, somehow. 

The doorframe was splintered, but the door still provided some protection. She would brace something against it while they slept, for her own peace of mind. She pushed it open and stepped inside. She’d stashed their bags in the entry way just before the rain had started, catching a glimpse of colorful paintings and a dusty coat in her haste. Now she stepped in slowly, dripping on the burnt orange runner. The painting next to the coat was of a seahorse with a sunset behind it, and next to that was a jellyfish on a black background. The entry way was just a short hall, opening up to the left. 

The house smelled dusty and stale, a little like magic. Unused. Laura stepped into the living room, eyeing the threadbare black couch piled with pastel colored pillows. There was no coffee table, just four baskets filled with wool and yarn balls. Every other surface in the room—the reading chair, a bookshelf, end table, the TV—was covered with knitting or crochet projects, some finished, others not. There were no knitting needles or crochet hooks anywhere. There were socks, blankets, hats, gloves, scarves, small jellyfish and teal pumpkins. 

Laura poked at a basket filled with fluffy cotton coated with dust, but nothing in the room seemed made of it, at least not by the witch who’d lived here. She went to the couch, sliding her bare feet over the soft carpet. She had to get dressed and check out the rest of the house, but the temptation to curl up on the sofa and sleep was _almost_ too powerful to resist. She shook herself and went back for her bag, holding it instead of wearing it to keep from getting it wet. 

Off the living room was a short hallway with three doors: a closet full of jars of leaves, weeds, flowers, and crystals, a bathroom so covered in dust it threw Laura into a sneezing fit, and a bedroom with a queen bed taking up most of it. Laura dressed in the bathroom, using a towel from a stack of them on a wicker cabinet to dry off first. 

The bathroom under the dust had black and white features and decorations except the paintings, which were vibrant beach scenes, and a jar of seashells on the back of the toilet, painted in jewel tones. 

Laura startled at her own reflection; there were no lights, obviously, just the dim light leaking from the window across the hall, but she could see plainly how rough she looked; smudges under her eyes, hair a flat, wet mess, leaner than she used to be. The mirror was cracked around the edges, creeping toward the center, blackened with dust along the top. She hadn’t really looked at her own reflection in a while.

She dressed with her gaze wide and fixed on the mirror, clumsily, hurriedly. It felt strange. Her image was strange, solid. 

She looked a little like her mother. 

She pressed her lips together, gaze darting to the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, the uneven ends of her dark wet hair, the angle of her chin like she was challenging herself. The slope of her nose, the bitten scabs on her mouth too insignificant for her healing to speed up. She turned away firmly, swinging her backpack on.

Peter and Derek stood, dripping, in the kitchen, watching her with pitiful expressions. 

She rolled her eyes. “There’s towels back there. Dry off and get dressed.” 

Derek waited a moment after Peter left, studying her, before he followed. 

Laura swallowed. Derek had always been quiet, but lately it felt like she was the only one saying anything, ever, and it was making her feel alone. With her pack right beside her. She straightened her shoulders and looked around the kitchen, black and pastel colors again. The table was big enough for three or four, but half of it was taken up by a laptop, notepads, a cup of pens, and a dead plant, like a desk. 

There was a cup, a plate, and two forks in the sink, covered in something slimy that Laura didn’t want to get close enough to examine. 

She turned away, running a hand through her hair. The kitchen looked too real, too paused, for her to keep looking at, so she went back to the living room, dropping her bag on the sofa. 

Peter wandered out first, dressed, hair still dripping all over his shoulders. 

“You guys can take the bed, it’s big enough.” She went to the bookshelf, running her fingers over one of the scarves draped on top. Something solid was buried under the pile. She moved them aside and uncovered a battered binder that smelled like magic. 

_Book of Shadows_ was written across the cover in bubbly, messy script. She picked it up impulsively, flipping it open. 

Spells were written on lined paper, decorated with stickers and washi tape that hadn’t faded in all the time it’d been sitting untouched. Probably magic. 

Peter raised his brows when she put it by her bag. 

“I dunno, maybe we can trade it to some witch for waterproof backpacks or something.” 

Derek came out rubbing a towel over his hair, frowning at Laura and Peter. “Laura, you can take the bed, you _should_ take the bed.” 

“No, I really want the couch.” She dropped onto it to prove it, sprawling over the pillows. 

Derek frowned at her.

Peter stood and stretched, yawning wide enough to crack his jaw. His hair stuck up everywhere the dryer it got, longer than he used to allow it to grow.

“We all need haircuts.”

Peter snorted and leaned over, knocking their heads together. 

“No kidding,” Derek muttered. He glanced over his shoulder as Peter left the room. “Are you sure-”

“Yes, Derek, I’m sure. I’ve been sleeping in dirt, this is the height of luxury.” She smiled at him. “Thanks. Are you…” What was there to ask? They were all tired and listless, with only their new goal keeping them going. “Goodnight,” she said instead. 

He watched her for a minute. “Goodnight,” he said at last, and left the room.

Laura flopped sideways over the couch, hissing when the binder dug into her side. She grumbled and yanked it out from under her, dropping it and her bag to the floor.

Outside, the rain continued to spatter against the windows, creating a pleasant, cozy white noise. Laura dropped her arm over her eyes and listened to it for a while, drifting more than sleeping. In the morning, they would have to find food, decide if they were moving on or staying for another day. She hoped Derek and Peter didn’t want to stay. While comfortable, she didn’t relish the idea of staying here, doing nothing, for an extra day. Staying out of the elements _seemed_ nice, but then they would be sitting here, no distractions, little if anything to do…

Plus, she thought grimly, there were the elves. The witch. They’d been ambushed twice more since the mystery explosion in the woods, but had managed to escape on their own both times by being ready. Sharp. They couldn’t relax and get comfortable until they were somewhere safe, not a random lucky house in the middle of a broken, spread out town. 

She sat up, rubbing her face. She couldn’t understand why the witch was after them—after _Peter_ , really. The elves who’d attacked them that first time had put chains layered in ice and magic on Peter, and they’d stabbed Laura. The fact that she wanted Peter for something wasn’t the question; it was _why_ was she trying to take Peter? 

Laura found a half finished sock in the couch cushions. She ran it between her fingers, thinking, but couldn’t imagine why Peter. His mutated shift? It hadn’t made him any stronger than other alphas, not that Laura had noticed. 

Derek huffed in the bedroom.

Laura listened to him get out of bed, go to the bathroom—tuned out _fast_ —and shuffle down the hall. She frowned. “Why are you up?”

He sat down on the floor by her leg, pulling his knees up. “I dreamed about Stiles.”

Laura kept her face neutral. “What about him?” she asked warily. 

His gaze drifted to the bookshelf, the rain spattered window above it. “I dreamed…he was hurt. He broke his leg and he was in pain and afraid, desperate.”

Laura swallowed. She’d dreamed a few days ago that Stiles and John were facing off against a giant crocodile. “I’m sure they’re just dreams,” she said aloud, even though she wasn’t sure at all. She’d felt Stiles’s pain and fear on and off since they’d all split up. Was he out there, hurt somewhere? Did she care? He’d abandoned them, although she still couldn’t shake the feeling that it was more than him running from his own lies. Could he…Her gaze darted to the hall. Could Stiles have been trying to lead that witch away? Why? They could’ve all hidden together. 

“Laura?”

She looked down; Derek’s face was tight, eyes gleaming with a sheen of gold. 

“Dreams?”

“What?”

“You said you’re sure _they’re_ just dreams.” 

Crap. She shrugged. “I assumed you had more than one.” She had, after all. Why not Derek?

He looked anxious. “If he really broke his leg somewhere…”

He was as good as dead, really. “We can’t do anything about it,” she said briskly. She smiled. “Besides, since when are you psychic? There’s no way you saw something real in your dreams.”

He nodded slowly. “Maybe not.” He tensed. “Hey.” He lunged at the window, knocking a knit cap off the bookshelf. “Look.”

Laura joined him and gasped. 

Two wolves were out in the side yard, a yellowish brown one and a deep brown one, picking their way through the debris in the grass. 

Laura tensed. They were both betas, so where was their alpha? She flashed her eyes and lifted her lip.

They swung to face the window, gold-glowing eyes wide when they noticed her. Instead of posturing, however, they went tense, then fled, tails tucked. 

Laura grimaced. “Great, that’s fun to worry about all night.”

“They didn’t get excited or try to get close. They were obviously scared.” 

She nodded, but she was still tense. What if they returned with their alpha, or their pack? They probably didn’t have either of those, but they _might._

Eventually, watching the window became too boring even with a possible threat hanging over them. Derek fell asleep curled up on the crochet rug in front of the TV. 

Laura stretched out on the couch and sighed, her mind still racing. Strange wolves, strange dreams. She pulled the binder out of her bag and flipped mindlessly through the pages. 

The spells were mainly about how to manipulate wool into yarn, and then into other things. Cotton was apparently harder for the witch to manipulate, because there were unfinished spells in the back talking about cotton. She made herself read the spells closely, until her eyelids began bobbing, her mind finally drifting into sleep. 

_She was in a small, dark room, a deep, throbbing pain in her leg that made her falter. She turned and there was Stiles, his face pale in the dark. She blinked and realized he was on a bed, with a brace on his leg and a bandage on his cheek._

_Safe._

Laura opened her eyes to blurry slits. 

Stiles was a faded image bent over Derek, brushing translucent fingers over the air near him, not quite touching.

She watched, heart in her throat, as Stiles’s face crumpled, his eyes impossibly sad, before he faded away. She blinked.

It was suddenly morning, and Derek was nudging her awake. 

“Here,” he mumbled. “Peter caught something.” He set a plate in her lap.

Laura sat up, rubbing her face. She must’ve fallen asleep for longer than it felt. She stared at where Stiles had stood in her dream. Maybe they were close by.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wooo late posting. x)

Stiles was going stir crazy. Even on Ari’s ship, there was more to do than just lie in bed and exist. He grumbled and flipped through Elle’s Book of Shadows, not really seeing the spells. He slapped it shut and turned to watch Cora. 

She was on the floor hunting a mouse with a lizard-like tail and fire breathing abilities. It was also very fast, resulting in a mildly entertaining chase. 

Stiles sighed and dropped his head on the pillow. He was bored. He couldn’t practice magic in here, there was no space. He glared down at the brace around his leg; he could be exploring, talking to people, seeing if this place really was a full on settlement, if it was trustworthy. 

Cora made a viciously satisfied noise. 

Stiles refused to look up; he instead focused on John, by the window reading the other Book of Shadows Stiles had been carrying with him, one full of garden magic he couldn’t do.

Someone knocked on the door.

Stiles sat up, nearly toppling off the bed in his haste. “Come in!”

Thea entered. 

He grinned widely. “Can I-”

“Your leg still needs bedrest,” she said sternly. “You tore it up pretty badly.” 

He scowled. “I need _something_ to do. I’m bored.”

Her hair was pushed back by a red headband today, matching the red woven into her gray shirt. “You’re healing,” she said, crossing the room. She motioned for him to lean back so she could examine his leg. 

“Yes, but-”

“No buts.” She layered another pain numbing spell into the brace. “Cora and John are welcome to explore, but you’re on bedrest.” 

“We’re good,” Cora said quickly.

Stiles glowered. “I can’t stay in here for days. I will go bat shit.”

“Let us know when you do, I’m sure we’d all love to witness it. We haven’t quite managed to make movies.” She straightened and looked him in the eye. “I think you and I both know you’ll be better off if you let it heal, even if you are bored.” She smiled. “I’ll see you in a few hours to check up again.” She waved on her way out.

Stiles flopped backwards and winced when it made his leg throb. As amazing as Thea’s spells were, his leg was still broken and moving it wrong still caused pain.

“Don’t be such a baby,” Cora said, flexing her claws against the floor. “You could’ve died instead.” 

He rolled his eyes at her. He absolutely knew that; it was just easier to be flippant on this side of disaster. He dragged his backpack over and sat up. He had time, so he might as well reorganize his bag. What he _needed_ to do, he reflected as he pulled things out one by one, was talk to someone about the curse on his arm. Here he was, near at least three other witches—Cheska, Ulric, and Thea—and he was hesitating. The problem was his leg. He wanted to see for himself, hear for himself, what this place was like, before he trusted them. What if they locked him up as a spy or worse, kicked the three of them out because of the tracking curse? He wasn’t sure which they would do, because he hadn’t had a chance to get a real feeling for the place and that made him wary. If he was going to tell them, it needed to be soon, so it didn’t seem like he was keeping it from them like a spy for Della. He’d seen enough survival movies to know they were on thin ice here if, of course, the whole place wasn’t full of cannibals. 

He checked the cuff on his arm to distract himself from _that_ horrifying thought. Alarm shot through him.

There were spidery cracks all over the metal. 

He clamped his right hand over it, heart hammering. They were less like cracks than scratches, but the magic in it had still taken a hit from something and had been weakened. 

Panic gripped him. He couldn’t risk peeking into Della’s mind, lest she peer back and see too much. She had more experience with psychic magic than him. He breathed deeply. The cuff was still scattering the tracking magic, which was all he needed. He pulled his sleeve down over it, so he could stop looking at it, and turned moodily to everything from his bag. His clothes were beyond filthy, crusted with mud and blood. Their first aid supplies could use restocking, and their food jars needed a good scrub. 

He set the little gray notebook Wyatt had given him beside Elle’s Book of Shadows, along with the pen. He ran his fingers over the cover of the book, sighing sadly. He looked at the rest of his stuff—a rock a mermaid had given him, a couple knives, a partially crushed roll of duct tape—but he’d lost his will to organize. 

Cora climbed on the bed with him, setting the jars aside so she could look at the Book of Shadows. She flipped the cover open, poked and sniffed the pages, opened the back cover. “How do spells work?” she asked, frowning at the page. “Why do witches write these and where’s yours?”

A pang went through him. He’d left his Book of Shadows and Claudia’s behind in Beacon Hills when Laura and Derek had woken him and John from the spell he’d used to protect them. There’d been a lot going on and he hadn’t had time to think about searching the wreckage of their house for the books. “Home,” he said awkwardly. “I forgot them at home. Um, and they’re to record our spells and process, our progress as witches.”

“Oh. But how do you do them?” She frowned at the page. 

“It’s about feeling the spell.” He made his circle of light spell to show her, then stretched his fingers, expanding the light. He didn’t have many gentle spells to show her, but she didn’t seem bothered by the simple one.

She made weak shadow puppets with the light, competing with the sun and grinning. “Cool.” 

He created fire in his palm, carefully, and brought his magic humming to the surface, like he’d done to show his friends magic when they were in high school. 

“You should blow something up,” Cora said gleefully.

“Not in here! But maybe to show you later, somewhere safe.” He glanced up.

John was watching, blank-faced, tracing the flames in Stiles’s hand up to his wrist. 

Stiles squeezed his fist to put it out. He reached out and found that John was nervous and uncomfortable despite his empty expression and relaxed posture on his cot. Stiles frowned. 

He was probably just restless like Stiles from being still and cooped up. He lifted a brow. “You done?”

Stiles flushed. He _still_ didn’t know how John could tell. He’d never noticed before. Of course, Stiles didn’t monitor him as closely or as often before. He hadn’t a reason to, except occasionally checking in when he worked long shifts or when Stiles got anxious. 

Or maybe he’d never said anything for the same reasons. 

_Most_ humans couldn’t tell, he was sure. Or was it that they didn’t know magic was real, so they dismissed the feeling? He rubbed his eyes. 

Cora rolled off the bed. “I’m hungry. We should go get food for Stiles.” 

“Oh, don’t you dare leave me in here alone,” he hissed. “We can all go get food together.”

She grinned. “But Thea said you have to stay in bed. How’s your leg supposed to heal if you’re _traipsing_ everywhere?” It had become her favorite word after Thea had used it.

Stiles glared at her. “I need to eat.”

“I can bring you food,” she chirped, prancing to the door. “Let me just—ah!” She leaped back.

The woman on the other side of the door shrieked, too. “Oh my gods, why?”

“You first!” Cora snapped. 

The woman frowned. “I thought you’d be hungry by now.” She leaned in to peer past Cora. She ran a hand over short black hair, gaze darting from John to Stiles. “Do you guys want to eat lunch with me in the cafeteria?” she asked, dark eyes gleaming. 

Stiles hesitated, but she seemed genuine, if a little…amused. 

“Thea’s busy, she’ll never know,” she added with a grin. “I’m Oona, I’m psychic.”

“Then yes, please get me out of here.”

She laughed, a bright, crackly noise, and gestured at them. “Well, Cora, aren’t you going to help him up? I’m not as strong as you.”

“How’d you know my name?” she asked warily while Stiles was maneuvering his legs over the edge of the bed, past the mess he’d made emptying his bag. 

“I know a little bit about a lot.” She grinned. “But I can tell you more later, let’s go. I asked Ulric to make plates for all of us.” 

It took a minute to get Stiles and his stupid leg to the cafeteria, but they eventually made it. Oona took them to the big table where Ulric was sitting. He had a woven basket at his feet, piled with thin white yarn or thread—maybe thread—which he was kneading between his hands little by little. He smiled. “Hey, guys. Lunch.”

Stiles’s gaze moved from the shirt Ulric was making barehanded to the plates set around the table. 

Burgers. Between two pieces of bread, with lettuce, tomatoes, and onions neatly set beside them and a pile of apple and banana slices. 

Stiles sat in a daze, barely paying attention to the others as he examined his burger. The bread, like everything else, was homemade, somewhat uneven, and warm. Stiles took a bite and huffed, eyes rolling. “Spices?” he mumbled around his mouthful. 

On either side of him, John and Cora were too busy eating to tease him for it.

Oona laughed. “We have herb and spice farms. They’re small but growing as Greta figures out the spells.” She grinned. “Cheska thinks in another ten or fifteen years, we’ll be a real town.”

Stiles was dubious, but to be fair, he was sitting at a table, in a building, eating a hamburger off a plate. She could be right. If they survived Della’s incoming attack, of course. His stomach twisted, but he continued to eat. He wasn’t going to waste his food _now._

“We eat a lot of beef,” Oona said apologetically. “The cows keep duplicating, which is good for leather and meat, but space gets tight.”

Stiles said, “Oh _no_ ,” because even in the apocalypse he was going to have to watch John’s blood pressure.

John laughed.

Oona frowned at him. “He’s right, you know, you should take care of your health. He’s worried.”

Ulric rolled his eyes. “Oona is psychic and incapable of staying out of people’s business.”

“I wouldn’t have the gift if I wasn’t meant to use it,” she sniffed. 

Ulric flicked a grin at John and Stiles. “She believes some destiny or higher power granted her psychic abilities. She’s religious.”

“I prefer spiritual,” she snapped. She looked at them. “I know what happened and I still think we were all given our powers for a reason, so I use mine.”

“No one said you shouldn’t,” Ulric grumbled. “But everyone has to learn not to eavesdrop, even psychics.”

Tension broke when Oona stuck her tongue out at him and he laughed. 

Cora finished her burger and fruit in record time. “How many farms are there? And people? Do they have jobs? Do any of the farms need help?” 

“Oh…probably. It’s mostly witches, but all sorts have shown up,” Oona said. “Kinetics, psychics, phoenixes. Most stay, even elves.” 

Elves…Stiles jolted as a memory came back to him. He looked at John, panicked, and saw the same look reflected back at him. “Hey, months ago, we—we ran into an elf who said she was on her way here…she was being controlled-”

“Wren,” Ulric cut in calmly. “She’s a few doors away from you, still recovering.”

Stiles’s jaw dropped. 

“We had to pool magic to free her, but it worked, sort of. The ice witch did a number on her mind.”

He looked between Ulric and Oona, but they looked calm, unfazed. “You guys…didn’t kill her?” 

Oona frowned. 

“If she’d have come in violent, we might’ve, to protect people,” Ulric said. “But we think she was meant to be a sleeper agent of sorts, so we freed her, like we do all of the Ice Witch’s victims that we can.”

“But…”

“Cheska wants to rebuild,” Oona said, her face clearing. “So she tries reasoning with everyone first, if she can. Those elf patrols injured some kinetics a few days ago, that’s why the perimeter guards are so jumpy.”

“Oh.” Stiles looked down at his plate, picking at the banana slices. He wasn’t sure what to make of this place. He’d come here prepared to be disappointed by whatever they found, prepared to hold out against whatever rose-tinted utopia they would try to peddle. He wasn’t sure what to make of them giving medical treatment to someone who’d tried to ambush them from the inside. 

Unless they _hadn’t_ , and were keeping her prisoner. He tensed, hand dropping to his leg. What if they weren’t helping, but instead hobbling him so he couldn’t escape once he figured out the truth? They did keep suggesting John and Cora leave him alone. But he hadn’t sensed anything but healing magic from Thea or the brace. Not that he couldn’t be fooled. 

He rubbed his forehead. 

“Are you alright?” Ulric asked, lowering his project. 

“Uh-huh. Just, um, tired.” He finished his meal while monitoring Ulric and Oona’s emotions, trying to sense any kind of deceit or ill will. 

Not that that would tell him anything. Maybe even they didn’t know.

Oona walked them back to Stiles’s room after lunch. She was shorter than Cora and curvy, with a soft, round face and cool russet skin. Not exactly villain material. She paused outside of Stiles’s door, tilting her head back to look him in the eye. “You’ll be up and moving in no time,” she said with a small smile. “You’ve got a lot to see here.”

“What do you mean?” John asked before Stiles could.

She just smiled. “See you.” She waved as she left. 

Stiles watched her go, refusing to go in the room despite Cora’s sort-of gentle tugging.

“What’re you doing?” she huffed. 

“I…have to use the bathroom. Alone.” 

John narrowed his eyes. 

Stiles gestured at the bathroom door across the hall. “It’s right there.”

“And if you fall?”

“Then I’m sure you’ll hear me yelling.” He crossed his arms, jaw set. 

Cora shrugged and went into the room, but John wasn’t so easily dissuaded. He looked like he wanted to speak, even opened his mouth, but then he relaxed and shook his head. “Fine. Be careful.” 

Stiles shrugged and limped to the bathroom. There was a high up window letting light in during the day, and the toilet was clearly scavenged, as was the sink, but the thing that boggled Stiles’s mind was that they _worked._ They had extra pipes and magic hums, but the toilet flushed, the sink ran, and there was soap in a clay dish by the faucet. Surreal. 

After awkwardly using the toilet and washing his hands with a hip braced against the sink so his leg didn’t have to take so much weight, Stiles limped out of the bathroom. With a glance over his shoulder, he went deeper down the hall instead of to his room. 

Most of the doors hung open, save for three—one was a closet, another had a sleeping werewolf beyond it, and the third…

Stiles rested his hand on the door, feeling for magical locks or alarms. Finding none, he opened the door slowly. 

The room looked a lot like his, except the bed was piled with multi-colored blankets and there was a branch of flowers on the bedside table. The elf on the bed had long, deep green hair and full blue eyes that widened when Stiles pushed open the door.

“Hi,” he whispered. “I’m Stiles, I-”

“Don’t you _knock?_ ” she snapped, rising from the bed. She had blue knitted slippers on her feet. 

“I—yeah, sorry.” He winced, embarrassed. “I just wanted to make sure you were…okay.”

That gave her a pause. “Do…do I know you?” Her fingers tangled in her hair, twisting through the strands. 

“Maybe? We met a few months ago. You’re Wren, right?”

She nodded, fingers twisting faster. “I don’t—I don’t remember you.”

Stiles swallowed. “You were on your way here.” 

She stiffened. “Oh.”

“They told me you were here and I just wanted to make sure you weren’t being held.”

She turned her face away. “No, I’m free to go. I just can’t…face them.’

“Who?” he asked as gently as he could.

She flung her arm at the window. “ _Them._ The people I tried to…They helped me, after I tried to hurt them. Cheska told me I could stay if I wanted but…” Her mouth twisted off to the side. “I wish I hadn’t made it here.” Then she sighed, posture relaxing. “I don’t mean that,” she muttered. “I’m glad I didn’t hurt anyone.”

Stiles nodded, mind whirling. He prodded delicately at Wren’s mind, just a very quick peek, but the only chaos in there was entirely hers. He pulled back quickly. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“What did you expect?”

He shrugged. “That they were keeping you prisoner.”

She nodded at his leg. “You think they might keep you?”

“It crossed my mind.”

“Paranoid. Smart.” She smiled a little. “I don’t know if I trust them or not,” she said quietly. “But they haven’t done anything but help me, and they’ve let people leave if they want, as far as I know.”

“I guess that’s the best I can get right now, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess so.” Her brows furrowed. “You were with a group, weren’t you?”

His hands flexed. “Yeah, I was. We split up.”

“Ah. May your leg heal swiftly.”

“Thank you. Sorry for barging in.” 

She shrugged. “I forgive you since you were checking on me.” She smiled. “See you later.”

He hobbled back to his room slowly, turning the conversation over in his mind. If this place was genuine, they had to do everything they could to protect it from Della. It could be home. He wasn’t sure what they’d do if it wasn’t real, if it was a front. He needed both legs working for protecting or fleeing, so either way, he was stuck for now.


End file.
